The Inquisitor's Apprentice (12 page)

"With a screwdriver. And, er, bubblegum."

Wolf smiled. "That's the first time I've ever heard of anyone fighting off a dybbuk with bubblegum. It sounds like your lab assistant could give the police a lesson or two."

"Oh! Yes! She's a most remarkable girl. But, er, very respectable, you understand. It would be quite improper to involve her in a criminal investigation. I could never forgive myself if..."

Wolf gave Edison another of his bland looks, and some silent message seemed to pass between the two men. Sacha smothered a grin. He had a feeling Edison was going to be much more cooperative from now on.

After that, they searched the lab. Sacha had been looking forward to this part. After all, Maximillian Wolf was the best Inquisitor in the NYPD, and searching magical crime scenes was what Inquisitors did best. Sacha figured he'd learn a lot from watching Wolf in action.

He didn't.

As far as he could see, the only evidence Wolf collected from the lab was a dried-up wad of lime green chewing gum and a long, red, curly strand of hair. He seemed to stumble on them largely by accident, since he spent most of his time staring into space as if he were a thousand miles away. And Sacha wasn't even sure Wolf thought they
were
evidence, since all he did was stick them in his pocket. Maybe he was just helping Edison clean up after the fire.

In the end, it was Sacha himself who found the big clue. In the dusty shadows under the etherograph something small and silver glinted. Without thinking, Sacha dropped to his stomach, stretched his arm under the machine, and grabbed for it.

The thing came loose with the little ping of a delicate chain breaking. It was a silver locket. The front was engraved with filigreed leaves and flowers. The back read "To Ruthie from Danny" in Yiddish. And inside the locket were three silken locks of baby hair.

Sacha stared at them, still too bewildered to be afraid.

He barely heard Lily when she came up behind him and said, "Hey, look what Sacha found!"

"Sharp eyes," Wolf said. "Good job there."

Sacha mumbled a reply, but his head was spinning and he barely knew what he was saying. Then Wolf reached for the locket—and before he could even think about what he was doing, Sacha closed his hand around it.

For a moment no one moved. There was a strange, subterranean roar in Sacha's ears, like the rumble of an approaching subway car. He could hear Wolf and Lily speaking to him, but they seemed very far away.

Then something compelled him to look up into Wolf's face. They locked gazes. Wolf's eyes were so pale that they looked almost transparent. Sacha felt like a rabbit cowering between the paws of some arctic predator.

Then the moment passed, and Wolf was his normal self again. "Sacha? I need to look at that. Please?"

Sacha opened his hand and let Wolf take the locket.

Wolf looked at the locket's contents and then turned it over to inspect the inscription. "It's Yiddish. Can you read it?"

"No!" Sacha gasped in a cold sweat of panic.

And that was Sacha's second lie.

W
HEN THEY LEFT
Edison's lab, Sacha was still so frightened that he barely noticed where Wolf was going. They'd loitered around the park entrance for several minutes before he realized that Wolf must be waiting for someone. And just who that someone was became obvious when Thomas Edison hurried past them.

Wolf grinned ... well, wolfishly. And then he set off in pursuit. Edison led them straight down the boardwalk to Peep Show Row. Sacha figured he was just passing through on his way somewhere else. But to his surprise, Edison ducked into one of the peep shows, right under the marquee sign for the "Dangerously Hot Little Cairo, Star of the Dusky East."

The ticket boy must have known Edison because he let him in without paying. But Wolf was another story.

"I've heard that excuse before," he drawled when Wolf explained they were there on official police business.

Wolf gave him a long-suffering look and flashed his badge—Detective Inquisitor gold and not just beat cop silver.

The ticket boy was less impressed than Sacha expected him to be. "You think I ain't seen one of those before? We pay our protection money nice and regular. We don't need to give out free tickets to the likes of you."

"If I were here to see the show," Wolf asked in rising frustration, "do you think I'd bring two children along?"

The ticket boy's gaze wandered from Wolf's badge to Sacha's worn cloth cap to Lily's white dress and patent-leather shoes. "I've heard that excuse too." He stuck out his hand again. "You stay, you pay."

Wolf sighed and handed over the money, and the three of them stepped through the curtain into the red-velvet-swathed theater.

The show was in full swing—and it was quite astonishing. Little Cairo certainly did have the raven curls and exotic attire of an Eastern houri. And she could also do extremely interesting things with her bellybutton. But as far as Sacha could see, no one else in the all-male audience was there to admire her dancing. Not that it mattered much what they were there for. Little Cairo's virtue was obviously quite safe. It was guarded by a massive woman seated in a folding chair on one side of the stage. She was built like a heavyweight boxer, and her hat was pinned to her head with the longest, sharpest hatpin Sacha had ever seen. The look on her face made it clear that she was willing and able to use the hatpin. And her uncanny resemblance to a much older, much fatter Little Cairo made it clear that she was the dancer's mother.

When the dance finally ended, Little Cairo waltzed off the stage, sweeping up armfuls of flowers and silken veils and feather boas. Mrs. Little Cairo rose ponderously, shot one last threatening glare at the audience, and followed her daughter into the wings.

Wolf cut through the crowd, leaving the two apprentices to elbow their way after him. When they finally caught up with him, he was standing at the door of Little Cairo's dressing room toe to toe with her formidable mother.

"Don't get hoity-toity with me, young man!" Mrs. Little Cairo stuck out her well-padded bosom and brandished a threatening fist in Wolf's face. Underneath her prim lace gloves, her hands were as meaty as a prizefighter's, and they looked just as capable of doing damage. "I already ran off one gentleman caller today, and I can run you off, too!"

"I assure you, madam—"

"Don't madam me! What kind of a girl do you think my daughter is?"

"—that I'm here on official police business."

"Hah! You think I haven't heard that excuse before?"

"Honestly," Lily whispered in Sacha's ear, "between her and the ticket boy, you've got to wonder what the Coney Island police
do
all day!"

Sacha snorted in laughter, earning himself a dirty stare from Mrs. Little Cairo.

"I'll have your badge number!" the dancer's mother bellowed, turning back to Wolf. "Let's see it!"

Wolf shrugged and fished his badge out of his pocket again.

"You'll hear about this," Mrs. Little Cairo huffed. "Let me assure you, Inquisitor Wo—oh!" She stopped cold as she read the name on Wolf's badge, and when she spoke again, it was in a simpering, almost girlish voice. "Inquisitor Wolf? Not
the
Inquisitor Wolf?"

Wolf bowed solemnly. "At your service, Mrs...."

"Darling. Mrs. Darling. Widowed." She giggled coyly and extended the hand with which she'd been threatening his life moments ago.

Wolf hesitated only for the briefest instant before bending to kiss it.

"Oh, Inquisitor Wolf ! I'm sure my daughter will be highly gratified by your appreciation of her art—to which, as you can see, she's simply devoted—though, mind you, she's
quite
unattached in any other sense. A fact which you might just consider mentioning next time you're lunching with one of your Astrals or Vanderbilks or any of your other great Wall Street Wizards or captains of industry—"

At this point the door to the dressing room opened and Little Cairo appeared. She took stock of the situation, pursed her bee-stung lips, and turned to her mother. "Mamma," she announced in an accent straight out of Little Italy, "I need a milk shake."

"Now?"

"
Right
now."

"But, my dear, consider your reputation! To receive a gentleman caller without your dear mother present to—"

"Mamma, I'm sure Inquisitor Wolf wouldn't dream of misbehaving with these two adorable children here." Little Cairo pronounced the word as if it were spelled
adohwable.

"But really, Rosie—"

"Mamma, I've lost two pounds this week!" Little Cairo plucked at the chest of her skimpy costume. "If I lose any more weight, we're going to have to
take in my clothes!
"

Mrs. Little Cairo gasped. Taking in Rosie's clothes, even by so much as an inch, obviously meant giving up all her motherly dreams of Broadway debuts and high-society weddings. "A milk shake!" she agreed. "And with extra malted powder! Tell me, my pet, do you think you could drink
two?
" She bustled off, muttering about the difficulty of keeping up a growing girl's figure through nightly performances and a doubleheader Sunday matinee.

Little Cairo watched her go with a look of fond exasperation. Then she walked into her dressing room and sat down at a wobbly wicker dressing table in front of a pink-rimmed heart-shaped mirror.

"Take a load off," she told Wolf and the apprentices. "And don't mind me, I gotta get out of this getup. It itches something terrible!"

She turned back to the mirror, primped at her raven black locks—and then lifted them right off her head, veil, spangles, and all. The hair underneath the wig was a deep, rich, glowing auburn: the same color that every fashionable woman in New York coveted. And in Little Cairo's case it was obviously natural—as was the way her curls swept into a ravishing Gibson Girl swirl with only a pat or two from her shapely fingers.

Sacha was still blinking in amazement at this transformation when Little Cairo pushed a pair of coke-bottle glasses onto her lovely nose. Then she peeled a gob of lime green chewing gum off the side of the mirror where she'd been storing it during her dance number, stuck it in her mouth, and started chewing as if her very life depended on beating the gum into submission.

"So," she said between chews, "whaddaya wanna know?"

"Your name and address would be a good start."

"Name's DiMaggio. Rosie DiMaggio."

Wolf had already started fishing through his pockets for the ever-elusive pencil, but now he looked up at her, perplexed. "Your mother said—"

"I know. She thinks Darling has more
social potential.
Mamma's very big on social potential. She says you need more than just talent to become a celebrity. She says you need to build a
persona.
"

"I see. And is working for Mr. Edison part of developing your social potential?"

Rosie stuck her hand out like a cop stopping traffic. "Now wait just a minute, mister! Let's get one thing clear from the get-go! If you tell my mother about Mr. Edison, then by gum, I'll ... I'll ... I'll..."

"You'll what?" Wolf sounded genuinely curious.

She glared at him ferociously. "You don't wanna know!"

"There's no need to threaten me, Miss Darling—er, DiMaggio. I'm investigating a magical crime. I have no interest whatsoever in your romantic entanglements."

"It ain't no 'tanglement," Rosie protested. "I ain't the 'tangling kind of girl! You think I'm just some common chorus-line hoofer? I'm gonna grow up to be an inventor, just like Mr. Edison! After that, maybe I'll have time for romance. But for now"—she pressed a shapely hand to her chest and heaved a romantic sigh—"for now, I am a Handmaid to Science!"

Wolf coughed. "And Mr. Edison is...?"

"He's giving me inventor lessons. You think you can just wake up one morning and start inventing? Not hardly! You gotta practice, practice, practice. It's just like tap-dancing."

"And your mother doesn't know about your inventor lessons."

"She wouldn't understand," Rosie wailed despairingly. "
She
wants me to be a
stawh.
"

"Excuse me. A what?"

"A
stawh.
A celebrity. She wants me to be a famous actress and get my picture in the paper and marry a millionaire." Rosie sighed fatalistically. "I know she only wants what's best for me. But a girl can't be practical all her life. A girl's gotta have dreams!"

"And Mr. Edison is helping you pursue your dreams by giving you inventing lessons ... er ... free of charge?"

"Not for free! For valuable services rendered! I'm his lab assistant. Which basically means I take the lab notes and clean up the mess after he explodes stuff, and if someone has to get electrocuted, it's me." Rosie grinned, flashing thirty-two perfect white teeth and one gob of lime green chewing gum. "But like they say on the turf, If you don't risk your money, you can't play the ponies!"

Wolf smothered a grin. "And was Mr. Edison in the process of electrocuting you yesterday when the ... er..."

"When the dybbuk showed up?"

Wolf's pencil paused. "Why is everybody so sure it was a dybbuk, anyway?"

"Because it was."

"How do you know?" Wolf asked curiously.

"Oh, it had all the classic signs. The cold and hungry look. That creepy wailing and gnashing of teeth in the outer darkness kind of aura. Plus, it
looked
like a dybbuk."

"And just what do you imagine a dybbuk looks like?"

"You know!" Rosie waved a hand vaguely in Sacha's direction. "Like ... like a nice Jewish boy."

"She seems to know an awful lot about dybbuks for an Italian girl," Lily pointed out acidly. "Doesn't anyone else think that's a little odd?"

Sacha jumped at the sound of Lily's voice. He'd been so busy staring at Little Cairo that he'd forgotten all about Lily. But there she was, sitting right next to him with a pinched-up look on her face like she'd just eaten a lemon.

"Oh, I know all about dybbuks," Rosie said, completely oblivious to Lily's hostile tone. "My cousin Maria walks out with a Yeshiva boy. Don't tell my mother, though. She'd tell Maria's mother, and wouldn't they just
scream!
"