The Dime Museum Murders (4 page)

No
sooner had the last of the marks bolted through the door than the
Spider-girl broke off her attack.

"Very
nice, Mrs. Houdini," said Albert, dusting off his hands. "I
doubt if Miss Bernhardt could have done better."

"And
the costume suits you," I added, gesturing at the bobbing
thorax, "but don't you think you're showing a bit too much
leg?''

"Very
funny, Dash," she answered. "I hear Weber and Fields might
be looking for a third comic. Why don't you run on down to the
Palace?"

"I
just came from there," I said. "They don't need
comics,
but there's a spot for a dancing girl, so long as she has eight legs.
Say, you don't suppose ... ?"

"Just
help me out of this thing, would you, Dash?" I walked behind the
pedestal and helped to disengage her from the apparatus. Bess stood
up and stretched to work out the kinks. "Tell me you've found us
another booking, Dash," she said. "Please tell me you've
found us another booking."

"Nothing
yet," I said.

"Father
preserve us," she said. "Have you told him yet? Have you
told the man whom the Milwaukee
Sentinel
called
the 'most captivating entertainer in living memory'?"

"Not
yet."

"I
wish you luck," she said, dabbing at some blood on her chin.

I
could hear Harry in the main room, shouting something about towels,
clean water, and performers of a certain "exalted magnitude."
Then the door banged open and my brother hurtled into the room, chin
first, looking like a boxer coming out of his corner. I knew that if
Harry followed his normal pattern, he would need about three minutes
to blow off steam. The steam usually blew in my direction.

"Dash!"
he called, barrelling toward me. "See what has become of the
Great Houdini! Have I not proved myself? Have I not created a unique,
exceptional act as the justly celebrated self-liberator, renowned for
his death-defying acts of bravery?"

"You
have indeed, Harry," I said. "Am I not the man whom the
Milwaukee
Sentinel
called
the 'most captivating entertainer in living memory'?"

Bess
and I exchanged a look. "You are indeed, Harry," I said.

"Europe
is rich with opportunity for a talented man such as myself, but I am
determined to succeed in America, the land of my birth. And yet, here
in the city of New York, the place I love above all others, I am
regarded as a simple conjurer. A mere magician! It is madness, is it
not?"

"It
is indeed, Harry," I said. "Intolerable," he said.
"You may walk with me to my dressing room."

You
may wonder why I put up with him. To be frank, I'd long since learned
to lower the volume on him when he launched one of his tirades. Had I
actually been listening, I might have pointed out to him that America
was not, in fact, the land of his birth. Hungary was the land of his
birth. Budapest, to be specific. America was the land of
my
birth,
which explained many of the differences between us.

He
led me into the dank back room of the butcher shop, toward a small
equipment closet that he had commandeered as a dressing area. His
mirror and makeup kit were neatly laid out on a block table
that—judging by the ragged grooves on its surface—had
once been used to saw carcasses. Harry sat down on a rickety stool
and faced the mirror.

"Why
won't they let me do the trunk trick, Dash?" he asked. “It
was such a hit on the road. I could be the finest escape artist who
ever lived. You see that, don't
you?"

"As
far as we know, Harry, you're the
only
escape
artist who ever lived. So there isn't a whole lot of demand for it
just yet. Everybody knows what a magician does. Nobody's ever heard
of an escape artist."

He
looked at himself in the mirror. For some reason, he insisted on
wearing full stage makeup on the sideshow platform, and spent half an
hour troweling on heavy foundation each morning. The dark pencilling
on his eyebrows and the orange tint of his cheeks made him look like
a stern carrot. He dipped his ringers into a wooden tub and began
slathering his face with butterfat, which was what we used for makeup
remover in those days.

"Why
don't we have some posters made up?" he asked. "That might
help. We could show me struggling with chains and handcuffs. 'Will He
Escape?' It would be very dramatic."

"Posters
cost money, Harry."

He
sighed and rubbed his face with a scrap of coarse wool. "What
about Sing-Sing? That would be free."

Harry
had come up with the idea of breaking out of a cell at Sing-Sing
prison, figuring that such a stunt would grab a fair number of
headlines. "I've spoken to the warden three times," I said.
"He doesn't want you anywhere near the place." Actually,
the warden's exact words had been somewhat more explicit, and
involved many repetitions of the phrase "brass-plated nut case."
I saw no reason why Harry needed to hear that.

"They
are afraid of Houdini," he said. "It will make them look
bad if Houdini breaks free of their brand-new jail."

Bess
crept past me and squeezed onto the stool next to Harry. "I
asked Albert about doing the trunk trick," she announced.

"You
did?" Harry looked at her in the mirror. "What did he
say?''

She
reached down and began untying the ballet slippers she wore on stage.
"You won't like it, Harry."

He
laid his hands on the table. "Tell me."

Bess
pulled off her slippers and began winding the ribbons. "Albeit
says that watching you is only slightly more interesting than
watching a cigar store Indian. He says that your patter stinks. I
believe he had much the same conversation with Dash."

Harry
turned to me. "Is this true?"

"He
may have mentioned something of the sort."

He
looked into the mirror and fell silent, his face a study in
dejection. Bess stood behind him and placed her hands on his
shoulders. "Well," he said after a time. "I don't
suppose I've ever heard—"

"Mr.
Houdini?" We heard a voice coming from the main room.

"In
here, Jack," Harry called, turning toward the
door.

Jack
Hawkins, the errand boy from Thornton's across the street, poked his
head through the doorway. He wore the red and gold uniform of a
theater usher, complete with a round chin-strap hat that concealed
most of his bright red hair. Alert and eager to please, Jack must
have been all of eleven years old at the time. Harry and I took an
interest in him because we'd both also worked as bellhops at his age,
and like Jack, we'd always been willing to jump though hoops for a
nickel tip.

"Evening,
Mrs. Houdini," Jack said, tugging at his cap. He thrust an
envelope at Harry. "Telegram came for you at the box office,
sir."

"Good
lad," said Harry. He was always saying things like "Good
lad" and "There's a good fellow" to Jack. He also
liked to tousle the boy's hair, which Jack endured with ill-concealed
annoyance.

Harry
unfolded the telegram and scanned the contents. "It seems that I
am moving up in the world, Dash," he
said,
raising his eyebrows. "I've been invited to the home of Branford
Wintour. On Fifth Avenue, no less."

I
whistled. "Branford Wintour? What's he want with you?"

"Who's
Branford Wintour?" Jack asked.

"They
call him the King of Toys," I explained. "There's hardly a
boy in America who hasn't played with one of his whirly tops. He has
a big factory in New Jersey—wooden soldiers, paper novelties,
train sets. Anything you can imagine."

"I
don't have much time for wooden soldiers," Jack said in a husky
voice.

"What's
he want with you, Harry?" I repeated. "Some sort of society
wing ding?"

"I
think not," Harry said. "It seems that Mr. Wintour has been
murdered, and only Houdini can tell the police how it was done."

Bess
and I looked at each other. Harry's patter—Albert's opinion
notwithstanding—was getting better by the minute.

"Harry,"
I said, as we trotted up toward Fifth Avenue. "You really need
to fill me in on the details. How was he murdered? Why do they need
you there?"

He
pulled the collar of his shaggy astrakhan cloak up around his ears,
pretending not to have heard.

"Who
sent the telegram? Why won't you tell me anything?"

My
brother closed his eyes and lowered his chin to his chest, apparently
lost in thought.

We
were riding in a horse-drawn calash, jostling hard as the driver
maneuvered around the evening theater traffic. Harry had said little
since we'd left the theater— nothing, in fact, apart from a
single line: "It is a case for the Great Houdini!" He
delivered this sentiment while throwing his cloak around his
shoulders.

Now,
sitting back against the leather seat with his brow furrowed and his
fingers steepled at his chin, he looked for all the world like the
hero of some stage melodrama.

"Harry—"
I began again.

"Dash,"
he said impatiently, "you cannot expect me

to
divulge the particulars. It is traditional that the detective remain
tight-lipped until he reaches the scene of the crime."

Ah.
Suddenly it made sense. "Harry," I said, "you're
thinking of detective
stories,
not
real detective work. And anyway, you're a performer, not a
detective."

"Performer!"
he snorted. "I am no mere performer! I am Houdini! I have
talents and knowledge that other men do not! At least our New York
City police seem to appreciate this, if the theatrical community does
not."

We
rode in silence for a moment. "At least let me see the
telegram," I said.

Wordlessly,
he passed it over. It read: "Need Houdini Urgent Home Branford
Wintour Stop Murder Investigation Stop Lt. Murray."

"Harry,
this doesn't tell us much. Apart from the fact that this Lieutenant
Murray is careful with his pocket change. Ten words exactly."

"It
tells us a great deal," he said.

"Such
as?"

He
gave me a corner-of-the-eye look. "It is a capital mistake to
theorize in advance of the facts."