Crossings (A Harry Reese Mystery Book 2) Read online

  At the Le Roy, the same colored fellow was on the piano. A while later he was joined by another fellow on the banjo, then another on the accordion. We’d arrived just in time for a cake walk and the contestants each took the floor in their turn. There were a number of noble efforts, but most were nothing more than poor rooster imitations and were quickly heckled off the floor. One fellow put a little too much into it and fell backwards, repeatedly, until finally rendering himself unconscious. Then two of the house girls gave their rendition. It quickly degenerated into a sloppy can-can, but there was no denying they had a keen sense of what would please their audience. Finally a very elaborately dressed colored fellow came on the floor. He was obviously the featured act, maybe a professional. By popular vote, he won the cake. Then we made our way out. We were next door to the Frauenverein now, but I saw no reason to mention it to Emmie. Of course, that would hardly have been necessary.

  “Now it’s my turn to escort you, Harry.”

  She half dragged me through the entrance and then into the room of the perpetual whist game. She greeted two of the women with a familiarity I found troubling, but not at all surprising, and then led me upstairs.

  “I should have known you’d be a member,” I said.

  “You’ve been here before, haven’t you, Harry?”

  “Yes, once.”

  “And you didn’t tell me about it.”

  “You never told me about it, Emmie.”

  “Yes, but that’s understandable. I saved you anxiety.”

  “How thoughtful.”

  We went up to the mezzanine, where I began to explain the mechanics of the roulette wheel, but Emmie knew all about it. Then we went back down and I spotted Sally Koestler sitting with Charlie Sennett, the fellow Demming had objected to. We went over and I introduced Emmie, and Sally asked us to join them.

  “How’s business?” she asked.

  “Well, as far as William Huber’s concerned, going nowhere.”

  “Dead end?” Sennett asked.

  “It seems that way. Did you know him?”

  “I crossed paths with him, but I wouldn’t say I knew him. Not like Sally did. Sad story.”

  “Yes.” It seemed unlikely Sennett allowed it to cause him much distress.

  It was then that things took a turn toward the fantastic. More precisely, Emmie-land. Elizabeth entered the room with an escort. An attractive, blond fellow of about thirty-five. Spotting our party, she led him over and introduced him to us as Edward Howell. While he went off for drinks, I introduced Elizabeth to Sally and Sennett. Given Emmie’s involvement in this “other matter,” it seemed a safe bet this was indeed Mrs. Barclay’s brother-in-law. Howell returned and the conversation somehow veered towards women’s fashion, a subject both Howell and Sennett seemed to know as well as the ladies. Then the little band started up and Sally voiced a need to dance. Howell hopped up and took her out on the floor.

  Then Emmie whispered in my ear, “I think we should go now, Harry.”

  “Yes,” I whispered back. “Elizabeth seems to have the ‘other matter’ well in hand.”

  We said our good-byes and walked over to Marcy Avenue and caught a car.

  “What did you expect to gain by having Elizabeth seduce Edward Howell?”

  “I wasn’t sure, really. But I wasn’t going to just give up on the case. And with his wife away, there seemed to be an opportunity.”

  “Well, at least you didn’t take on the task yourself.”

  “Oh, I’d never make a convincing seductress.”

  “You led me astray.”

  “I don’t think I did, Harry. But thank you for saying so.”

  “You’re welcome, Emmie.”

  “On the other hand, your friend Sally seems quite the peach.”

  “Why do say that?”

  “The shameless way she jollied all the men.”

  “She didn’t jolly me.”

  “She tried, you just didn’t notice.”

  “I need to work on my powers of observation.”

  The next morning, the two of us breakfasted alone again.

  “I’ll be across the river this morning, Harry. Perhaps we can meet for lunch?”

  “What will you be doing across the river, Emmie?”

  “Oh, nothing interesting, I’m afraid. I was going to look at some curtain fabric. Remember, we’ve just two weeks to our move.”

  We agreed on a rendezvous and I went off to the Bureau. I hadn’t been there five minutes when a phone call came for me. It was Ratigan.

  “I know you said to wrap things up, but I thought you might want to hear the latest news on Osborne. He’s at the morgue.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “No, he’s there all right. One of our fellows was over there taking the morning roll call and recognized the name. The description fits.”

  “How’d he die?”

  “Found in the East River, apparently drowned. That’s all we know.”

  I thanked him and called Tibbitts and was told he was at the morgue. Keegan wasn’t in, but I assumed this reopened the case and so I left for the morgue. It was next to Bellevue, right on the river. I asked for Tibbitts and in a short while he came out.

  “Things are getting interesting,” he said.

  “Have you learned anything?”

  “The doctor’s just looking at him now. Come on.”

  He led me to a white room where Osborne was lying beneath a bright light. The doctor and his assistant flipped him from side to side, on his stomach and then back around, the doctor scanning everywhere we could see and peering in the places we couldn’t. Then the assistant rolled the body away while the doctor went to a sink to wash.

  “What’s the verdict?” Tibbitts asked.

  “There are no obvious wounds. No cuts, no abrasions.”

  “Suicide?”

  “I don’t see how. He didn’t drown. I’m guessing heart failure. There’ll be an autopsy. Perhaps this afternoon.”

  “Well, can you make it as soon as possible? There’s a lot of heat on this case.”

  “All right, but it won’t be completed before noon. I can telephone with the results.”

  “No, I won’t be in the office. I’ll come back here.”

  Tibbitts and I walked out to the street.

  “I think I have a witness,” he said.

  “Of what?”

  “About five o’clock yesterday afternoon, a guy on the 10th Street ferry saw someone drop off the tail of another ferry. He told a crewman, and they signaled the other boat. But by that time, no body could be located. The ferry people thought that maybe the witness was seeing things, but they reported it just the same. Osborne was found down by Pier 60. That kind of fits in, too. That’s where the current would take him. This witness is way up the West Side. Do you want to go with me?”

  “No, I need to go over to Sovereign. They may be in a panic.”

  “That’s why I want to go in the opposite direction,” he smiled.

  “Did you talk to someone there?”

  “No. One of our fellows saw Osborne worked for Sovereign from something in his wallet. He knew I’d been working this case, so he called me. But they know about it now.”

  When I got to Sovereign, I went up to see Perkins.

  “No one’s told me a thing about it,” he said. But I noticed the flipping of the letter opener had quickened.

  “Isn’t that odd?”

  “Not really. I’m the Superintendent of Agencies. They must have told Redfield or someone else upstairs.”

  He seemed to have become determinedly uninterested in the case. A case he had raised the alarm on. He suggested he could take me upstairs, but said it with a notable lack of enthusiasm. I declined and left him. There wasn’t any panic evident in the Claims Department. I went into Osborne’s office and closed the door.

  He had his own files, where he kept copies of any claim he had questioned. Some were ultimately paid, others weren’t. There were two cabinets of them
and it would take days to go through them, so I concentrated on the desk. He had a calendar, but the only appointments he seemed to have were meetings with others in the building. And there was nothing listed for the previous afternoon. I went through the desk a little more carefully, even pulling out drawers. Then, under the blotter, I spotted two cards, like the ones they used to track policies. I was just reaching for them when the door flew open. I dropped the blotter and rose from the desk to greet a fellow who had the look of a cop out of uniform.

  “Who are you?” he asked.

  “My name’s Reese. I’m with the Gotham Insurance Bureau. Investigating a matter at Mr. Redfield’s behest.”

  “Why don’t I know about it?”

  “I couldn’t say. Who exactly are you?”

  “Arkin. I’m head of security.”

  “Did you know Osborne was found dead this morning?”

  “No—how do you know it?”

  “I happened to be visiting the morgue.”

  He took me to a room on the first floor and left me with an underling. Then he went into an inner office and made three phone calls. He strolled out with a superior grin on his face.

  “They say your services are no longer needed. And they already told your boss as much.”

  “He must have neglected to mention it. Thank you for clarifying the matter.”

  It was getting near noon, so I made my way back up to the morgue. Tibbitts came in right after me and led me back to a room where the autopsies were performed. The doctor was just finishing.

  “I was right,” he said. “He had an enlarged heart. He could have died at any time. He must have been aware of it.”

  “It couldn’t be anything else?” I asked.

  “There may have been something that aggravated the condition and caused the heart to fail at that particular time. But cause of death is certainly heart failure.”

  “What sort of things would aggravate it?” Tibbitts asked. “Alcohol?”

  “Perhaps. But it could be anything—physical exertion, mental stress, some patent medicine. Or it may have just been his time.”

  We left him and I asked Tibbitts if he’d learned anything from his witness.

  “Nothing new,” he said, then read from his notebook: “He was in the bow of a boat headed from Greenpoint to 10th Street. A boat going from 23rd Street to Williamsburg crossed in front of them and he saw a guy on the rail near the stern of the boat, reading a newspaper. The guy dropped the paper and slumped over the rail. He thought the guy was throwing up, but then he just fell forward and into the river. He figured someone on the other boat must have seen it. But when the other boat didn’t stop, he went up and told the crew of the boat he was on. It was probably ten minutes before they got to the spot and the current must have taken him down.” Then he looked up. “Kind of sounds like a guy with a bad heart, whose time had come.”

  “But I wonder if someone made the appointment for him. No one can still believe this is all happening by chance. Have you spoken to Osborne’s family?”

  “A fellow from Brooklyn brought his housemaid over to identify the body.”

  “Not his wife?”

  “She’s out of town, visiting her sick mother or something. They wired her the news.”

  “Had the maid reported him missing?”

  “No.” He glanced at his notebook. “She said she was planning on doing it this morning, but then the locals showed up at the door and told her he was dead. She last saw him yesterday morning.”

  “Did she mention his heart?”

  “Yeah, she said something about it. How’d it go with Lady Custis? Is she cooperating?”

  “Oh, yes. Definitely an interesting girl.”

  “And dangerous,” he smiled.

  He went off to file his report and I went down to meet Emmie. I was twenty minutes late and she was at a table reading.

  “You’re late, Harry. The waiter has stopped being friendly.”

  “When I tell you why I’m late, Emmie, all will be forgiven.”

  And of course it was.

  12

  When I arrived back at the Bureau, Keegan was in his office. He already knew about Osborne’s death, but I told him what the doctor had to say. And about my reception at Sovereign.

  “There’s little chance this death is a coincidence,” he said.

  “Yes, and here’s another for you. A woman named Marquisee killed herself last week. She lived in the Eastern District and her husband is a builder. Since Huber’s father is a real estate lawyer, they almost certainly knew each other. I was sure I saw a policy in that name when I looked through Huber’s files. But I found no trace of it at Sovereign this morning.”

  “Do you have the copy from his office?”

  “When I went back to get it, it was gone. The girl in the office said someone from Sovereign came and picked up some files the day before. I thought perhaps I’d just misremembered.”

  “But now you think Osborne was involved and he took the files?”

  “No, it was a young woman who took the files. But Osborne may have sent her. The doctor said mental stress might have been the catalyst for his heart failing. Being a party to an unraveling conspiracy certainly would have caused a fellow like that a lot of stress.”

  “Yes, it seems the likely explanation.”

  “Why is Redfield trying to shut down the investigation?” I asked.

  “He’s starting to panic. He’s deluded himself into thinking he can keep a lid on this and it will blow over.”

  “But he brought it to us. What changed his mind?”

  “Their shares are crashing. Didn’t you know?”

  “No, it’s not something I follow. Doesn’t that mean it’s already public?”

  “Think of how many people know about this. Several people at Sovereign, the police, people here, Demming, people at Newcome’s, and anyone else you consulted. If just a few of them acted on it, it would be enough to start rumors on the Street.”

  “Acted on it how?” I asked.

  “By shorting Sovereign’s shares, of course.”

  “What’s shorting exactly? Selling the shares?”

  “Yes, selling shares you don’t own. You then have a negative position. If the price of the share goes down, your position increases in value.”

  “I see. So the people who’ve shorted the shares want them to fall further?”

  “Yes, that’s obvious,” Keegan said. “However, the people to whom Sovereign sells insurance still know nothing about it. There’s no way to keep this from eventually becoming public, but they should be able to gain some control over how that happens.”

  “So am I back on the case?”

  “Yes, but don’t contact anyone at Sovereign directly.”

  “Then who are we working for?”

  “I’m going to confide in you, Harry. Redfield is cracking up over this. There are those on Sovereign’s board who want to replace him before anything becomes public. But they aren’t ready to execute their plan yet. That information doesn’t leave this room. Understood?”

  “All right. So once they do take control, we can expect their cooperation?”

  “Most assuredly. I’m in contact with most of them.”

  “The police detective working on this is pretty suspicious himself. I don’t see how Redfield can call him off.”

  “He’ll try,” he said. “What we need is a complete explanation of what the scheme entailed and who’s behind it. Names, dates, everything. That way, when we make it public there can be no second-guessing.”

  “I have to admit, I’m pretty far from anything like that.”

  “Yes, I know. But move as quickly as you can. And try to share as little information as possible with the police—they have their own allegiances.”

  There was a note from Emmie on my desk. She’d stopped by while I was with Keegan to let me know she wouldn’t be home until late that evening. Then I telephoned Ratigan and asked to meet with him at his office. When I
arrived, he greeted me with a smile.

  “So the investigation is on again?”

  “Yes, but before we get to anything else, I’d like you to find out what Osborne was doing the day he died. He was on the ferry between 23rd Street and Broadway in Williamsburg. But he worked downtown. And it certainly wouldn’t be his usual route home.”

  Ratigan assigned a couple operatives to that and then I spent most of the afternoon giving him all the details I’d accumulated on the case. We agreed his people would look again at Huber, Barclay, and Farrell, as well as the wives. And now Jacob Marquisee—the only living link still in town.

  “I’ll try to talk to Marquisee directly,” I said. “But see if you can link him to any of the Hubers. And also find out if Mrs. Marquisee was a gambler.”

  I took the ferry across to Williamsburg, but it was too early to expect Marquisee to be home from work. And as I passed the Carleton, I felt an intense thirst. I went into the saloon via a side entrance. The bartender greeted me with a smile.

  “I’m not sure I should serve you, Mr. Reese.”

  I made as if to leave, but he motioned me back. “Just having fun.”

  Emmie was right, her little theatre had increased my notoriety. The gang was even more convivial than before, and I made several new friends. Eventually, I managed to make Clara Marquisee’s suicide the topic of conversation.

  The bartender offered the requisite banality, “Very sad.”

  “Marquisee took it hard, I heard,” another fellow added.

  “Do you know him?” I asked.

  “We used to live just around the corner.”

  “Does he know why his wife killed herself?”