The Alienist (54 page)

Suddenly, from my left, a somehow familiar voice came out of the darkness:

“You ain’t killing anybody, you miserable bastard.”

Sore as my neck was, it turned quickly to catch sight of Connor, walking down the promenade and holding an impressive Webley .445 revolver. Behind him came two figures who had by now taken on the status of old acquaintances: the same thugs who’d come after Sara and me in the Santorellis’ tenement, who’d dogged Laszlo’s and my steps during our trip to visit Adam Dury, and whom I’d unceremoniously ejected from the Boston–New York train.

Connor’s shifty eyes went thin as he stepped toward Beecham. “You hear me? Get the hell away from that kid.”

Very slowly, Beecham released his grip on the boy. His face became an absolute blank, and then it changed dramatically: for the first time an emotion—terrible fear—became apparent in the widening of the eyes. Just when it seemed that those organs could open no further, they began to blink, rapidly and uncontrollably.

“Connor!” I said, finally overcoming my astonishment. Turning to Laszlo for an explanation, I saw him eyeing our apparent rescuer with a look of both hatred and satisfaction.

“Yes,” Laszlo said evenly. “Connor…”

“Get those two down,” Connor said to one of his men, as he leaned over to pick up Kreizler’s Colt. He kept the Webley trained on Beecham as the man to his right moved somewhat grudgingly to free first Laszlo and then me. “And you,” Connor said to the cowering murderer. “Get your fucking clothes on, you blasted sodomite.”

But Beecham made no move to comply. His expression became more fearful, he huddled closer to the wall—and then the spasming began. Initially it was slow, involving only the blinking of the eyes and a tug at the right corner of the mouth; but soon the entire right side of the face was contracting violently and at a quick clip, producing a pathetic effect that I must admit would have seemed, under other circumstances, cruelly laughable.

As he watched this transformation take place, a look of blatant disgust came into Connor’s bearded face. “My God,” he said. “You sick, miserable bastard…” He turned to the man on his left. “Mike—cover him up, for God’s sake.” The man went over, picked up Beecham’s clothes, and threw them at him. Beecham grabbed the garments and held them close, but didn’t try to dress himself.

Once Laszlo and I were back standing on the promenade we both spent a few seconds trying to loosen up our painfully cramped arms and shoulders, while Connor’s thugs went over to stand behind their chief again.

“Aren’t you going to untie the boy?” Laszlo said, his voice still marked by harsh bitterness.

Connor shook his head. “Let’s get a few things straight, first, Doctor,” he said, as if, despite the Webley, he was afraid of what Kreizler might do. “Our business is with this one here”—he indicated Beecham—“and only with him. You get on out of here and there’ll be nothing more to it. The whole business ends tonight.”

“Indeed it does,” Laszlo replied. “But not in the way that you anticipate, I’m afraid.”

“Meaning?” Connor asked.

“Meaning that our leaving is out of the question,” Kreizler answered. “You made it so when you fouled my home with your murderous presence.”

Connor shook his head quickly. “Now, just you wait, Doctor—I wanted none of that! I was doing my job, following the orders I’d been given, and that little bitch—” Kreizler’s face betrayed open rage and he took half a step forward. Connor gripped the Webley tighter. “Don’t do it, Doctor—don’t give me a reason. Like I say, we’re only here to do this one, but you know full well I’d be happy to make it the three of you. That might not please my bosses—but if you give me cause, so help me, I’ll shoot you down.”

For the first time, Beecham seemed to fix his attention on what was happening around him. His face still spasming, he turned to look at Connor and his thugs; then, in a sudden flurry, he scurried over near Laszlo’s legs.

“They—” he said tremulously. “They’re going—going to kill me.”

Connor chuckled once gruffly. “Yes, it’s dead you’ll be when they take you off this wall, you damned fool butcher. All of this trouble over you, and what are you? A poor excuse for a man, with your whining and crawling.” Connor began to swagger a bit in front of his cohorts. “Hard to believe, ain’t it, fellas? That—
thing
there is what this has all been about. Just because his idea of fun is to fuck little boys and then cut them up.”

“Liar!”
Beecham suddenly bellowed, balling his fists but staying in a crouching stance. “You filthy liar!”

At that, Connor and his men began to laugh, exacerbating Beecham’s emotional turmoil. As the mocking howls went on, I walked over to stand by Beecham without knowing why, then gave the three laughing fools in front of me a disapproving scowl that produced no effect. Turning to Kreizler in hope of getting some guidance, I saw that he was staring down the promenade past Connor and his men, his face a picture of anticipation. His mouth fell open, and for no reason that I could divine he suddenly shouted:

“Now!”

And then all hell broke loose. With the speed and precision that only years of professional training can breed, an ape of a man leapt up and over the inner promenade fence and crushed Connor’s gun-wielding hand with a stout section of lead pipe. Before the other two thugs could react several lightning combinations of blows from two enormous fists laid them both out on the promenade. The howling Connor soon shared the same fate. Then, just for good measure, the newcomer—his face hidden under a miner’s cap—leaned over each man’s head in succession and delivered a series of resounding blows with the lead pipe. It was a clinic in violence that was awesome to behold—but my joy at the attack faded considerably when the performer stood up and finally revealed himself.

It was Eat-’Em-Up Jack McManus, former prizefighter and current enforcer of decorum at Paul Kelly’s New Brighton Dance Hall. Tucking his piece of pipe into his pants, McManus picked up both the Colt and the Webley and then stepped toward me. I braced myself, reasonably calculating that Laszlo and I would be the next victims of his pugilistic artistry; instead, McManus straightened his shabby jacket, spat hard into the waters of the reservoir, and handed me the guns. I trained the Colt on Beecham as Jack slowly walked up to Kreizler, raised a hand, and touched the brim of his cap respectfully.

“Well done, Jack,” Laszlo said, at which I almost hit the pathway beneath me in a dead faint. “Bind them, if you would, and gag the two bigger men. The one in the middle I’ll want to talk to when he comes around.” Laszlo studied Connor’s body, evidently impressed by McManus’s work. “Or perhaps I should say,
if
he comes around…”

McManus touched his cap again, crossed back in front of me, then produced several lengths of rope and two handkerchiefs and carried out Laszlo’s instructions like a patient, laboring ox. Kreizler, in the meantime, went quickly to the bound boy, and began to free his mouth, hands, and feet.

“It’s all right,” Laszlo said soothingly, as the youth continued to sob and whimper uncontrollably. “It’s all right, you’re quite safe now.”

The boy looked up at Laszlo, eyes wide with terror. “He was going to…”

“What he was going to do is no longer important,” Laszlo answered with a small smile, producing a handkerchief and wiping the boy’s face. “What
is
important is that you’re safe. Here—” Laszlo retrieved his somewhat mangled opera cloak from the promenade and wrapped it around the shaking young man.

With everything under control, at least for the moment, I satisfied my curiosity by approaching the fence on the street side of the promenade and taking a quick look over it. A few feet below, strung before our arrival and held in place by climbing pitons much like the one that Marcus had found at Castle Garden, was a length of stout rope. As Kreizler had suspected, getting around and behind us had been no great job for an experienced climber like Beecham. I turned back around and looked at our now beaten foe, shaking my head at the sudden, baffling way in which the tide had turned.

Jack McManus had finished the job of binding Connor’s men, and he looked to Kreizler expectantly. “Well, Jack,” Laszlo said. “All secure? Good. We won’t be needing you further. But again—my thanks.”

McManus touched his cap one last time, then turned and strode back down the dark promenade without saying a word.

Kreizler turned to the boy again. “Let’s get you inside, shall we? Moore, I’m just going to put our young friend here in the control house.”

I nodded, keeping the Colt leveled at Beecham’s head as Laszlo and the boy disappeared inside. Still huddling and spasming, Beecham had begun to let out a quick, guttural little whimper of his own. It didn’t appear that he’d give me any trouble, but I wasn’t taking any chances. Quickly scanning the area, I saw his knife lying on the pathway, and moved to pick it up and tuck it into the back of my own pants. Glancing at the unconscious Connor, I noticed that he had a pair of manacles clipped to his belt. I retrieved them and tossed them to Beecham.

“Here,” I said. “Get these on.”

Slowly and absentmindedly, Beecham fit the manacles around his wrists, closing first one and then the other with some difficulty. I searched Connor’s pockets and found the key to the restraints, after which I noticed that there was a small bloodstain on Connor’s shirt. Unbuttoning the dirty garment and then pulling it aside, all the while keeping my gun on Beecham, I saw that Connor had a long, half-healed wound in his side, which had apparently been torn back open by Jack McManus. It was the injury, I realized, that Mary Palmer had inflicted before Connor had flung her down Kreizler’s stairs.

“Good for you, Mary,” I said softly, standing away from Connor.

Kreizler came back out of the control house, running a hand through his hair and surveying the scene before him with evident, if rather amazed, satisfaction. Then he looked my way self-consciously, as if he knew what was coming.

“You,” I said, evenly but very firmly, “are going to tell me what in hell is going on around here!”

CHAPTER 45

L
aszlo had just opened his mouth to reply when the sound of a sharp whistle echoed up from Fortieth Street. Kreizler ran to peer over the street-side fence of the promenade, and I quickly joined him, looking down to see Cyrus and Stevie in the calash.

“I fear that explanations will have to wait, Moore,” Kreizler said, turning toward Beecham again. “Cyrus and Stevie’s arrival means that the opera has been over for at least three quarters of an hour. By now Roosevelt’s suspicions have been thoroughly aroused. He’ll have checked with the others at High Bridge Tower, and when they learn of our disappearance…”

“But what do you plan to do?” I asked.

Kreizler scratched his head and smiled a bit. “I’m not terribly sure. My plans didn’t quite provide for this situation—I wasn’t entirely certain that I’d still be alive, even given our friend McManus.”

That stung me, and I didn’t mind showing it: “Oh,” I huffed, “and I suppose I would have been dead, too!”

“Please, Moore,” Kreizler said, waving his hand impatiently. “There simply isn’t time.”

“But what about Connor?” I demanded, pointing to the former detective’s prostrate form.

“We shall hold Connor for Roosevelt,” Laszlo replied sharply, crossing over to where Beecham sat huddled. “Though he deserves far worse!” Crouching down to stare Beecham in the face, Laszlo drew a deep breath to calm himself, then held a hand in front of our prisoner’s eyes and moved it back and forth. Beecham seemed utterly oblivious.

“The boy has come down from the mountains,” Kreizler mused at length. “Or so it would seem.” I took his point: if the man we’d first encountered on the walls that night had been the evolved version of the cool, sadistic young trapper who’d once roamed the Shawangunks, then the terrified creature now before us was the inheritor of all the terror and self-loathing that Japheth Dury had felt at every other moment of his life. Evidently aware that there was little to fear from the man so long as he was in this mental state, Laszlo took Beecham’s jacket from him and draped it around the man’s huge, bare shoulders. “Listen to me, Japheth Dury,” Kreizler said, in an ominous tone that got Beecham to finally stop swaying and moaning. “You’ve a great deal of blood on your hands. That of your parents, not least of all. Should your crimes become known, your brother, Adam—who is still alive and still attempting to carry on an honest, decent life—will most certainly be privately destroyed and publicly hounded. For that if for no other reason, the part of you that is still human must pay close attention to me.”

Though Beecham’s eyes remained quite glassy, he nodded slowly. “Good,” Laszlo said. “The police will be here soon. They may or may not find you waiting when they arrive, depending on just how honest you are with me. I’m going to ask you just a few questions now to determine your ability, as well as your willingness, to cooperate. Answer these questions truly and we may be able to arrange a less severe fate than that which the people of this city will demand. Do you understand?” Beecham nodded again, and Kreizler produced his ubiquitous little notebook and a pen. “All right, then. The basic facts…”

Laszlo then launched into a fast, condensed, yet calmly worded review of Beecham’s life, beginning with his childhood as Japheth Dury and going into some detail concerning the murder of his parents. As Beecham answered these queries, all the while confirming more and more of the hypotheses that we’d formulated during our investigation, his tone became increasingly weak and helpless, as if in the presence of this man who somehow knew him as well as he knew himself there was no choice other than complete submission. For his part, Kreizler became ever more satisfied by Beecham’s earnest attempts to cooperate with his inquisition, finding in them proof positive that a hidden yet still strong part of the murderer’s mind had indeed craved this moment.

I suppose that I, too, should have been deeply gratified at the results of this initial interview; yet as I watched Beecham answer Laszlo’s questions—his voice growing ever more compliant and even childish, with none of the threatening, arrogant tone he’d used when we were his prisoners—I became powerfully irritated, disturbed at the very core of my spirit. This irritation soon became outrage, as if this man had no right to exhibit any pitiable human qualities in light of all he’d done. Who was this enormous grotesque, I thought, to sit there confessing and sniveling like one of the children he’d slaughtered? Where was all the violence, cruelty, arrogance, and unstoppability that he’d displayed on other nights? As these and similar questions shot through my head, my anger mounted rapidly, until suddenly, unable to contain the feeling any longer, I stood up straight and bellowed:

“Shut up! Shut the hell up, you miserable coward!”

Both Beecham and Laszlo immediately grew silent and looked up at me in shock. Beecham’s facial spasms intensified dramatically as he eyed the Colt in my hand, while Laszlo’s attitude soon changed from one of stunned surprise to chastising comprehension.

“All right, Moore,” he said, not asking for an explanation. “Go and wait inside with the boy, then.”

“And leave you with him?” I said, my voice still trembling with anger and passion. “Are you insane? Look at him, Kreizler—this is
him,
this is the man who’s responsible for all the blood we’ve seen! And you sit here letting him convince you that he’s some kind of—”

“John!” Kreizler said, stopping me. “
All right.
Go and wait for me inside.”

I looked past Kreizler at Beecham. “Well? What
are
you trying to convince him of?” I leaned down, keeping the Colt pointed at Beecham’s head. “Figure you can still get out of it, don’t you?”

“Damn it, Moore!” Kreizler said, grabbing my wrist but unable to make me move the gun away. “Stop!”

I drew closer to Beecham’s spasming face. “My friend thinks that if you aren’t afraid to die it’s proof that you’re crazy,” I seethed. With Laszlo still trying to disarm me, I shoved the barrel of the revolver up against Beecham’s throat. “Are you afraid to die—
are you?
To die, like the boys you—”

“Moore!” Kreizler shouted again.

But I was far past listening. Struggling to get my thumb on the hammer of the Colt, I pulled it back in a jerk, causing Beecham to let out a desperate little cry and then pull back from me like a trapped animal. “No,” I seethed at him. “No, you’re not crazy—you
are
afraid to die!”

With stunning suddenness, the air all around us was consumed by a gunshot. A resonant, slapping sort of impact sounded from somewhere just under my hand, and then Beecham rocked backward in a jerk, revealing a crimson-black hole in the left side of his chest that wheezed with the sound of escaping air. Fixing his small, straining eyes on me Beecham let his manacled hands fall and then slumped over, his jacket falling from his shoulders as he did.

I’ve killed him,
I thought clearly. There was neither joy nor guilt in the realization, just a simple acknowledgment of fact—but then, after Beecham had crumpled to the stone pathway, my gaze fell on the hammer of my Colt: it was still cocked. Before I could get my confused brain to make any sense of this sight, Laszlo had jumped over to Beecham and made a cursory examination of the bullet wound. Shaking his head as the unpleasant sound of gushing air and blood continued to come out of Beecham’s chest, Laszlo made a fist and looked up furiously. His glare, however, was directed past me; and following it, I turned around slowly.

Connor had somehow slipped his bonds, and was standing in the center of the promenade. His back was bent with dizziness and pain, and he was clutching his bleeding side with his left hand as he held a small, crude twin-barreled pistol with the other. A twisted smile came into his bleeding mouth, and then he staggered forward a step or two.

“It ends tonight,” he said, holding the gun higher and pointing it at us. “Drop it, Moore.”

I complied, slowly and carefully; but just as the Colt touched the pathway another gunshot cut through the air—this one from farther off—and then Connor jerked forward as if he’d been struck hard in the back. He fell on his face with a small grunt, revealing a hole in his jacket out of which blood began to pump immediately. The powder smoke from the shot Connor had fired at Beecham had not even cleared when a new figure stepped forward on the dark promenade and became visible in the moonlight.

It was Sara, pearl-gripped revolver in hand. She stared down at Connor for an instant without betraying any emotion, then looked up at Kreizler and me.

“I thought of this place just after we’d gotten into position at High Bridge Tower,” she said tightly, as the Isaacsons appeared in the darkness behind her. “When Theodore said you’d left the opera, I knew…”

I let out an enormous breath. “And thank God you did,” I said, wiping my brow with my hand and then picking up the Colt.

Laszlo stayed in a crouch by Beecham, but looked up at Sara. “And where is the commissioner?”

“Out searching,” Sara said. “We didn’t tell him.”

Laszlo nodded. “Thank you, Sara. You had little reason for such consideration.”

Sara’s expression remained impassive. “You’re right.”

Beecham suddenly let out with a bloody, choking cough, and Kreizler got an arm under his neck, bringing the large head up. “Detective Sergeant?” Laszlo said, at which Lucius rushed over to assist him.

Taking a quick look at Beecham’s chest, Lucius shook his head definitively. “It’s no good, Doctor.”

“Yes, yes, I know,” Kreizler snapped. “I just need—rub his hands, will you? Moore, get those blasted manacles off. I just need a few minutes.” As I freed the dying man’s hands Laszlo reached into his pocket, brought out a small vial of ammonia salts, and wafted them under Beecham’s nose. Lucius began to slap and rub at Beecham’s palms, while Laszlo’s aspect became steadily more concerned and his movements steadily more agitated, until they reached a level of near desperation. “Japheth,” he began to murmur, softly but pleadingly. “Japheth Dury, can you hear me?”

Beecham’s eyelids fluttered for an instant and then opened, the dulling orbs beneath them rolling helplessly about in his head. Finally he fixed them on the face that was very close to his own. He wasn’t spasming, now, and his expression was that of a terrified child who looks to a stranger for help that he somehow knows he isn’t going to get.

“I—” he gasped, coughing up a little more blood. “I’m—going to die…”

“Listen to me, Japheth,” Laszlo said, wiping blood from the man’s mouth and face as he continued to cradle the head. “You must listen to me—what did you see, Japheth? What did you see when you looked at the children? What made you kill them?”

Beecham’s head began to shake from side to side quickly, and then a shudder went through his body. He turned his terrified gaze to the heavens and opened his jaw wider, revealing the big teeth, which were now coated with blood.

“Japheth!” Laszlo repeated, sensing that the man was slipping away.
“What did you see?”

As his head continued to shake, Beecham’s eyes shifted back to Laszlo’s pleading face. “I—have never known—” he gasped, the tone both apologetic and pleading. “I—have never—known! I—didn’t—they—”

The shaking in his face spread throughout his body for an instant, and then he grabbed Laszlo by the shirt. Face still full of mortal fear, John Beecham spasmed one final time, spat some blood mixed with vomit out one side of his mouth, and grew still. His head rolled away from Kreizler, the eyes finally losing their expression of terror.

“Japheth!” Kreizler said once more; but he knew it was too late. Lucius reached up and closed Beecham’s eyes, at which Kreizler finally lowered the dead man’s head back down to the cold stone beneath it.

No one spoke for a minute or two, and then there was a sound: another whistle from below. I stood up, moved to the outer promenade fence, and looked down to Cyrus and Stevie, who were pointing toward the West Side urgently. I waved to them in acknowledgment and then went to Kreizler.

“Laszlo,” I said carefully, “offhand I’d say Roosevelt’s on his way. You’d better get ready to explain—”

“No.” Though Kreizler did not lift his head, his voice was firm. “I won’t be here.” When he finally sat up straight and looked around, I could see that his eyes were red and moist. He looked from me to Sara, then at Marcus, and finally to Lucius, nodding as he did. “You have all given me your help and your friendship—perhaps more of each than I’ve been entitled to. But I must ask that you continue to do so for just a little while longer.” Standing up, Kreizler spoke to Lucius and Marcus. “Detective Sergeants? I’ll need your assistance in removing Beecham’s body. You say Roosevelt’s coming by way of Fortieth Street, John?”

“I’d say so,” I answered, “based on the way those two are carrying on down there.”

“Very well, then,” Kreizler went on. “When he arrives, Cyrus will direct him up here. The detective sergeants and I will take the body out through the Fifth Avenue gate”—Laszlo walked to the street-side fence and issued a command by waving one hand—“where Stevie will be waiting.” He stepped over to Sara and took her by the shoulders. “I wouldn’t blame you if you refused to be any part of this, Sara.”

She looked for a moment as if she were about to erupt with a spiteful indictment—but then she simply shrugged and put her pistol away in a fold of her dress. “You haven’t been honest with us about this part of it, Doctor,” she said. Her hard look softened. “But if it hadn’t been for you we never would have had the chance in the first place. I’m prepared to call it even.”

Laszlo pulled her close and embraced her. “Thank you for that,” he murmured, and then stepped back. “Now, then—in the control house you will find a rather terrified boy wrapped in a fairly decent cloak of mine. Go to him, would you, and see to it that Roosevelt asks him no questions before we’ve had time to get downtown.”

“Downtown?” I said, as Sara moved toward the control house doorway. “Wait a minute, Kreizler—”

“There’s no
time,
John,” Laszlo said, moving toward Marcus and speaking to both him and Lucius. “Detective Sergeants? The commissioner is your superior, and I will understand if—”