Edison Effect, The: A Professor Bradshaw Mystery (The Edison Effect) (8 page)

Taylor had a habit of cocking his head and looking at Bradshaw with both admiration and amusement. The admiration, he knew, for Taylor had explained, was for Bradshaw’s teaching style that built confidence in his students, for his several patents and practical electrical skills, and of late, his ability to solve electrical puzzles and crimes. Taylor’s amusement lay in Bradshaw’s dislike of social interaction. As a man who thrived on conversation, Taylor found Bradshaw’s hermit tendencies befuddling.

“I haven’t seen enough of you of late,” said Taylor, turning away from the telescope to cock his head and give Bradshaw a grin. “Since you began your new career as Seattle’s Sherlock Holmes, as a matter of fact. How are you?”

The question was not just politely asked, but honestly so.

“Confused,” he said, and felt better for saying it aloud.

“Come take a look,” said Taylor. “Feel your insignificance against the vastness of the heavens, and you’ll gain a bit of perspective.”

Bradshaw put his eye to the lens. Cracks in the storm clouds created a window into the blackness of space. Even in that small window, it seemed a thousand stars winked.

Taylor said, “I’ve heard it said there are more stars in the heavens than grains of sand on the Earth.”

It was a staggering thought.

“Yet among them, do any contain life such as we have here on Earth?” Bradshaw asked. “Or are we alone?”

“Come now, Bradshaw! Leave it to you to find a gloomy thought while stargazing. Tell me what has you confused and let’s see if a solution can be found.” Taylor took a metal rod from a hook, opened a small door in the base of the telescope and began winding the weights which regulated the clockwork-style mechanism within.

Bradshaw considered speaking of Missouri, but the Catholic Church was vehemently opposed to both the Masons and the Odd Fellows, with which Taylor was also affiliated. The grounds for the church’s opposition were ideological, and Bradshaw knew Taylor found them unsubstantiated and ridiculous. They’d once enjoyed a vigorous friendly debate on the subject, and while Taylor would never be disrespectful, he certainly would find it difficult to understand Bradshaw’s allegiance to Catholicism if it opposed his choice of wife.

“Did you ever meet Oscar Daulton?” Bradshaw began.

“No, I never met him,” Taylor said. “Does this have something to do with the search for his invention? I heard Thomas Edison paid you a visit to inquire about it.”

“That’s where it may have begun, with that visit. Edison has a representative here, Mr. J. D. Maddock, who is now actively looking for it.” Bradshaw explained about his summons to the Bon Marché and everything he’d learned subsequently that held a possible connection between the hunt for Daulton’s device and Vernon Doyle’s death. He didn’t speak of Doyle’s alleged affair, or the accusation against Olafson. Neither was relevant to the search for Daulton’s device and could be kept private.

“Such a troubled young man,” Taylor said, shaking his head. “It’s a shame his genius was so warped and may have led to this. I didn’t know him, Bradshaw, but I’ve met his type. If you can get to them young enough, you can save them. I’ve taught boys at nearly every age, or had them in my office as principal. When one slips out of your grasp and goes awry, it’s heartbreaking. Professor Ranum knew Daulton.” He spoke of the current Director of Astronomy. “He’s mentioned that Daulton spent a good deal of time here, alone.”

Daulton had found several places on campus where he could be alone. As Bradshaw had told Edison, he’d searched them all, including the Observatory, for anything the young man had left behind or hidden. Daulton had written extensively on other aspects of his disturbed life, but his journal contained not a hint of his inventions. He wrote of winning the war against oppression, but always stopped short of describing the weapons he planned to use, other than secrecy.

“I want to locate Daulton’s box.”

Taylor’s eyes flashed with interest. “Now that’s an about-face, and the source of your confusion, I’ll wager. How can I help?”

“Galloway Diving has been searching near the ferry landing and into the bay, to a depth of about a hundred and ten feet.”

“You believe they should be looking elsewhere?”

“More than two years’ worth of dives and they’ve found nothing but the basket.”

“I don’t imagine something that small would be easy to find in the dark depths. Most of Elliott Bay is far beyond the reach of divers, hundreds of feet deep. Maybe a thousand, in some parts. It’s only the edges that man can reach. How close to the landing were you when Daulton tossed the thing?”

“I don’t know.”

“Perhaps it sank below the mud.”

“That’s very possible. The batteries likely would have, if they hit mud rather than rock or weeds. They weighed two pounds each, and their cylindrical shape would drop more quickly and penetrate better than a flat-bottomed box.”

“How much did the box weigh?”

“I never lifted it, and I can only guess as to what was inside. I believe it was heavy and would sink fairly well, but whether there was something inside providing buoyancy, I don’t know. It vanished when it hit the water, and did not linger, the same as the batteries.”

“Who calculated the location?”

“Jake Galloway, based on newspaper and personal accounts of the day when Daulton threw the box overboard.”

“There’s an art and science to finding sunken treasure. Galloway has a good reputation.”

“It could be he’s better with the art than the science. Would you be interested in looking at the data and making a guess?”

Taylor beamed. “I would. But surely you know the math as well as I, and I recall a certain waterfall over which you did not plummet because of your grasp of hydraulics.”

“But I don’t have time to research the tides and currents of Elliott Bay, nor experience with a sextant, nor do I know the captain of the
City of Seattle
.”

“Aah, you see how being active socially has its benefits? Can you provide a range of guesses as to the weight and buoyancy of Daulton’s mysterious cigar box?”

“I can.”

“Can we take a ferry ride and recreate the event? If I clear it with the captain?”

“I was hoping you’d ask. Do you have the time?”

“For this I do. I’ll begin my research at once.”

“Thank you. I have preparations to make. It might take a bit of experimentation. Shall we say near the end of next week, if the weather allows?”

“Agreed. If our findings indicate a location not yet searched, will you go for a dive, Bradshaw?”

“I’d sooner dance naked at a society ball.”

“An image more gruesome than any monster of the deep. But if you have no intention of diving for it, why try to establish its location? You don’t mean to give the information to Edison’s man?”

“No, I don’t. But I’d like the mystery solved. I’m tired of thinking about it, and if Vernon Doyle’s death is related to the hunt, then the device is still killing, even from the seabed. Let’s first see what our calculations tell us before I decide what to do with the information.”

“Speaking of mysteries, occasionally when I’m up here in the dome alone, I hear a strange clicking sound. It’s rather like static, a sharp crackling. But I can’t pinpoint it. I heard it just before you arrived.”

They stood quietly, listening, but heard nothing.

Bradshaw asked, “Could it be the metal of the dome expanding or contracting with the change in temperature?”

“It doesn’t seem to come from above. And there’s a different quality to this clicking. It’s more, oh, sharp, less creaking.”

“Hmm. Well, if you hear it again, count the clicks, and time the seconds between the clicks.”

“Will that tell you the nature of the sounds?”

“No, but it will make the sounds less irritating if you treat them like a science experiment.”

Taylor laughed. “You show potential, Bradshaw. We may yet find your funny bone. And say, I’ve been hearing rumors about you and Henry Pratt’s niece. Could she have anything to do with your confusion and venture into wit?”

Bradshaw shrugged and held out his hand, “Sir, I thank you for your assistance and I look forward to next week.”

Taylor accepted the shake and the less-than-subtle change of subject with good grace. “Take care, my friend.”

***

On his way back downtown, Bradshaw’s eye was caught by a small shop open late for the holiday season. The glowing window display was filled with colorful bars and fancy boxes of soap. If he couldn’t buy that gown for Missouri, because it wasn’t a gown but an undergarment, maybe he could buy her soap. When the streetcar slowed, he leapt off, and backtracked to the shop. Inside the store, his senses were bombarded with warmth and fragrances. He chose a box of lilac-scented imported soap that smelled of spring, wondering if it was too intimate a gift. It was surely more appropriate than a chemise. When she’d lived in his home, the scent of lilac often lingered in the bath and near her room. The kindly sales clerk wrapped the soap box in lavender paper, tied it with delicate gold ribbon, and topped it with a flowery golden bow.

With the box safely nestled in his coat pocket, he walked to his office, finding it dark and empty. Henry had left a note reporting he intended to spend the night asking about Vernon Doyle in the Tenderloin. For a few hours, Bradshaw worked at his desk, the fragrant gift beside him. When his eyes grew weary, he bundled up again, and took the last streetcar up to Capitol Hill.

Only the porch light glowed at his house, as he’d hoped, and yet he felt guilty for avoiding his son. Inside, he climbed the stairs, stepping over the third one that tended to creak, then looked in on Justin, who slept soundly. In his own room down the hall, he switched on the electric wall sconce, and immediately spotted the telegram on his dresser. Mrs. Prouty believed all of Missouri’s correspondence contained “swooning,” so she placed letters and wires from her in his room. Like so many others in his life, Mrs. Prouty was ambivalent about his relationship with Missouri.

He set down the soap, opened the wire, and felt his weariness harden into a heavy weight. She was not coming home. Not as planned. She’d written in abbreviated language to reduce the cost of the wire.

WRIGHT BROS ATTEMPT FLIGHT NC COLIN INVITED ME OTHERS HOME DELAYED 1 WEEK LOVE MISSOURI.

Chapter Ten

Bradshaw woke Friday morning, the third day of the investigation into Doyle’s death, with a growling stomach, which didn’t bode well. This being a Friday during Advent, it was a day of fasting, and that meant he was restricted to one full meal at dinnertime with fish, but no meat.

He bathed and dressed, then went downstairs to the kitchen where the smell of Justin’s warm oats and maple syrup enveloped him in a tortuous embrace. Bradshaw was only allowed a warm beverage this morning, and two ounces of dry toast. He usually skipped the toast but could not be so noble this morning. He ate his slice slowly, savoring the sourdough flavor, grateful for Mrs. Prouty’s gift for bread-making. He sat at the kitchen table across from his son, watching him devour a great mound of syrupy oats, two thick pieces of toast slathered in butter, and a fried egg. Children were not held to the fasting rules, and for this the Jesuits were surely grateful. A room full of lads with empty stomachs would not be teachable.

“Three days,” said Justin, once he’d cleaned the last drip of butter from his plate with his last bite of toast.

“Three days?”

“Until Missouri gets home.”

Bradshaw’s stomach clutched and his hunger fled. He’d had a whole night in which to consider the implications of Missouri Fremont traveling to North Carolina to meet up with Colin Ingersoll. “A change of plans, son. Missouri won’t be home until the twenty-first or second.” He told Justin about her invitation to North Carolina, forcing enthusiasm into his voice. It was a wasted effort. Justin scowled.

“She said she’d be home twelve days before Christmas.”

“I know, but with each attempt, the two Wright brothers have been getting closer to success. They may achieve powered flight. This could be historic. A once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

“So is Christmas. It only comes once a year, and this one will never come again. A boy only gets so many, Dad.”

“That’s true. I hadn’t thought of it that way.”

Justin crossed his arms and asked, “When you’re married, will you make her stay home?”

Bradshaw stalled by drinking his coffee. He cleared his throat. “First of all, it’s not when, but if. You know I care very much for Missouri, but we haven’t yet decided to marry.” He’d had to explain this several times to the boy ever since his relationship with Missouri had changed. In his son’s young eyes, there was no reason for delay or any question of an outcome. Justin loved Missouri, he saw that his father did, too; therefore, they would marry. “And secondly, a man does not treat his wife like a child.”

“But Roy said when his sister got married they had to say vows, and she had to say she would obey her new husband. She didn’t want to say it because she’s a suffragette, but they made her say it, and now she has to do whatever her husband says.”

“Roy? The new boy at the end of the block? His family belongs to the Episcopal Church, I believe. The Catholic marriage ceremony doesn’t include the word
obey
. Even so, in all Christian marriages, wives are to be treated kindly and with respect.” Had he given his son the impression that women were servants to men? He certainly hadn’t intended to teach his son anything but respect for women.

What relationships had Justin witnessed? What relationships had Bradshaw modeled? The only female Justin regularly observed Bradshaw with was Mrs. Prouty. Mrs. Prouty certainly did all the work about the house, but he paid her a good wage and rarely made demands, only requests. Which, admittedly, Mrs. Prouty acquiesced to, sometimes willingly, other times with a grumble. Yes, she obeyed his requests as if they were demands, and he was the master of his home. Someone had to be in charge, and it was his home after all, not Mrs. Prouty’s. Although, in truth, it was her home. She had no other. This had been her home for more than a decade. What must that be like? To know the home you live in is not yours, but owned by your employer, and that you live there as a condition of your employment? But Mrs. Prouty was not really an employee. She was like family. He would never think of letting her go, hiring another housekeeper. She knew that, surely.

And household dynamics, with the man in charge, was a tradition for a reason. Men typically understood the world better than women. Men were better at finances and management and leadership. And yes, Catholicism supported this. Husbands and wives filled different family needs, but they did so with respect. As his thoughts continued, he found them becoming more and more defensive. He heard Missouri’s laughter, saw her rolling her eyes, heard her telling him she knew he didn’t truly believe that men were naturally better managers. But he did. Didn’t he? Men and women had roles in life. That was that. And to that, he distinctly heard Missouri say, as if she were standing before him,
I think he doth protest too much
. As usual, she made him question the very foundations of his beliefs, and she was twenty-five hundred miles away. What would life be like if they married? If conversations such as these were real? He could well imagine a sort of emotional vertigo taking hold, feeling dizzy all the time because he would no longer have the stability and structure of his beliefs. She would say that of course men and women were different, but those differences were not limitations. Women should be as free as men to pursue their heart’s desires.

And then he imagined her smiling at him with both pity and love, stepping up to him with a challenge in her eyes and a tease on her lips …He shook his head and with a deep breath said in a tone he hoped would make his son smile, “Can you imagine Missouri promising to obey anyone?”

But it wasn’t Justin who replied, it was Mrs. Prouty. “Not for a minute,” she declared, then untied her apron from around her ample waist. Bradshaw glanced around, and Mrs. Prouty said, “He ran off to school a minute ago, just as the first mail arrived.” She waved a sheet of paper and he caught a glimpse of Bon Marché letterhead.

“A personal invitation, Professor! It’s a secret sale. I’m going downtown to catch it, and I know just what I’m getting, too. That music box I’ve been wanting for so long, with the carousel. It’s way beyond my means, usually, but with this letter, I’m going to get it. I’ll stay all day, if I have to, to be one of the chosen shoppers.”

The Bon was likely trying to make up for lost sales yesterday and erase the stigma of a death in their store. It must be quite a sale to get Mrs. Prouty willing to be extravagant and out of the house before her dishes—he mentally stopped himself—
her
dishes? Was this one reason why Justin so easily accepted that women were subservient to men? Having a housekeeper around, but no mother figure to show him a relationship different from one between a man and paid help?

She hurried off to take advantage of the sale, and Bradshaw, after a glance at the sky to see that it was blustery but not pouring, pedaled his bicycle to the university to review for his freshman students the term’s work on magnetism. Afterward, he climbed the stairs to his office and telephoned Henry, but the operator said there was no reply at the requested number. Henry was likely still asleep. Interviewing in the Tenderloin was hard work.

Bradshaw bundled up, hopped on his bicycle, and headed back to town, toward the Cascade neighborhood of South Lake Union. It was time for one of his least favorite parts of investigations. It was time to meet the widow.

***

In many areas of Seattle, keeping mud out of the house required constant vigilance, and Republican Street was no exception. Blocked from the main part of town by Denny Hill, the hill where the tunnel supporters were losing to the demolish supporters, Vernon Doyle’s neighborhood was a mix of industry and homes, and the result was not harmonious for the homeowners. Noise, steam, construction, and functional but unattractive factories and businesses marred the coziness of residential lots. When the landscape architect John Olmstead had come to Seattle in the spring to advise on the development of parks, he’d opined that this part of town was best suited for industry, and Bradshaw had to agree. He would not want to live here.

Doyle’s house had no front yard to speak of, just a strip of scraggly grass and dirt between the street and the road. Bradshaw propped his bicycle against a utility pole and picked his way across the muddy strip to the cement steps leading up to the door. It was a narrow house with cedar shingle siding, two stories high, if you counted the tall attic space, which, from the curtains in the window, appeared to be used as living space.

Mrs. Doyle opened the door on his first knock. Her gentle appearance surprised him since her husband had been rather rough. She was small and slender in a black mourning gown, her dark hair showed streaks of gray where she wore it swept up in the current style, but her rounded cheeks and warm brown eyes gave her a tender countenance her husband had lacked.

“Yes?” In the flatness of her voice her grief was revealed.

Bradshaw introduced himself, and she nodded in understanding, but her eyes remained kindly and somber. “The detective said you would be by sometime. Please, come in. I’m sorry things aren’t more tidy.”

He stepped into an immaculately clean parlor, with gleaming floors, bright wool rugs, and the welcoming warmth of a small wood-burning stove. She took his coat, hanging it from a coatrack where he spied the temperance sash O’Brien had mentioned. He left his rubber overboots by the door before taking the seat she offered him by the stove. Although there were two weeks yet until Christmas, red glass and shiny silver ornaments hung from a metal stand in the corner, and boughs of evergreen and holly berries decorated a sideboard.

“I’m very sorry about your loss, Mrs. Doyle.”

“Thank you. That’s kind of you.” She wrung her hands, twisting the simple gold band on the ring finger of her left hand. “I hear myself saying thank you, but it’s like somebody else is speaking. It’s been three days since Vernon didn’t come home, but I still don’t quite believe it. He’ll walk in the door any minute now, and I’ll wake up from this dream.”

He noticed she didn’t say nightmare, or even describe the dream as awful. “I understand what you’re feeling, Mrs. Doyle. The shock of a sudden death can be hard to accept.” And was it simply the suddenness of it that made it hard for her to accept? Had he heard grief in her voice, or merely the trauma of the unexpected? Or the shock of having done something so terrible it didn’t seem real?

“I haven’t told the boys yet. I think about it. I sit down to write, or several times I’ve put on my coat to send a wire, but then it seems so wrong. Like I’m about to tell them a lie.”

“You have two sons?”

“Yes.” Her eyes went to a framed photograph on the wall of two boys a bit older than Justin, with mischievous smiles, so difficult to capture in children. Getting them to hold still for the length of the exposure was nearly impossible.

“That’s by Edward Curtis of Curtis and Romans Photographers,” she said, and there was pride in her voice. “I don’t think he’s there anymore, though. They say he’s off photographing Indians before they’re all gone. His brother takes pictures, too, but not portraits. He does buildings and streets and things.” She smiled tenderly at the photograph. “My mother gave me the sitting as a gift seven years ago. They grow up so fast, and then they move away, but in your heart, they stay your little boys.”

“Where did they go?”

“Junior, our eldest—his name is Vernon, like his father, but he goes by Junior—he’s in the army, in Virginia. Fort Myers. They’ve assigned him to the Signal Corps, and he says he loves it, but I’m not—I wasn’t supposed to tell his father. Vernon always wanted Junior to follow in his footsteps, but Junior didn’t want to be anything like his father. It turns out, he has Vernon’s cleverness with mechanical things, though, and the army saw that right away. He’s working with the wireless telegraph, learning how to send and receive signals.”

“That will be a good career for him. And where is his brother?”

“Charlie got the itch to see the world, and went off tramping. He’s not as clever as Junior at schoolwork, but he more than makes up for it with energy and, oh, a hunger for life, you might say. But he didn’t get any further than Ohio before he a met a girl.” A wry smile put a touch of life in her eyes. “He’s working at a lumber mill, of all places. He could have stayed right here and done that.”

“But the girl wasn’t here.”

Mrs. Doyle’s sad smile momentarily brightened. “No, she wasn’t here.”

“They’ll want to come home for their father’s funeral.”

Her smiled vanished. “No, they won’t.” She covered her wedding ring with her other hand, and didn’t meet his eye. “They didn’t get along, truth be told.”

“I’m sorry.”

“You know how it is with boys, and Vernon could be—” She twisted her ring, and chewed her lip. “He could be difficult. They both left as soon as they finished school.” Her voice had gone flat again.

He would like to comfort her, tell her that her sons would surely want to come home to see her, but he didn’t know that to be the truth.

“Do you have other family in Seattle?”

“My mother passed last year. Vernon has some kin in eastern Washington, but I didn’t tell them. They surely read it in the paper. They get the Seattle papers over there. I haven’t heard from them, and I don’t expect to. Vernon didn’t get along with them, either.”

“What about friends?”

She flashed him a small smile. “You are kind. I am not alone in the world, Professor, but I do thank you for your concern. I have friends who are near and dear to me, and they have been checking on me every day. They will be coming tonight with a meal and plan to sit and keep me company awhile.”

“That’s good.”

“I’ve been keeping busy. Sticking to my routine. If I try to think about tomorrow—I’ll have to find a job. I’ve never had a job. What would I do? I can’t imagine. I don’t know how to do anything, except work around the house. I’m too old to go into service. Aren’t I?”

He opened his mouth to reply that his housekeeper was more than a decade her senior, but he realized she might not find that a comfort, and so he held his tongue.