The Alienist (42 page)

“But you’ve got to tell me something, honestly, before you go,” Dury said, as he walked us back to the surrey. “This business about writing an article on cases that have gone unsolved—is there any truth in that? Or are you going to reopen this case alone and speculate about my brother’s involvement by using the information I’ve given you?”

“I can assure you, Mr. Dury,” I answered, the truth enabling me to speak with conviction, “there will be no newspaper articles about your brother. What you’ve told us allows us to see how the police investigating the case went wrong—nothing more. It shall be treated just as you’ve told it to us—in the strictest confidence.”

That brought a firm shake of my hand by Dury. “Thank you, sir.”

“Your brother suffered a great deal,” Kreizler answered, also shaking Dury’s hand. “And I suspect that his suffering has gone on, in the years since your parents were killed—if indeed he is still alive. It is not our place to judge him, or to profit from his misery.” The tight skin of Dury’s face grew tighter as he strained to hold back strong emotions. “I have just one or two more questions,” Laszlo went on, “if you wouldn’t mind.”

“If I have the answers, they’re yours, Doctor,” Dury said.

Kreizler inclined his head appreciatively. “Your father. Many Reformed ministers place little emphasis on church holidays—but I get the feeling he did otherwise?”

“Indeed,” Dury answered. “Holidays were among the only pleasant occasions in our house. My mother objected, of course. She’d get out her Bible and explain why such celebrations amounted to papistry and what punishments those who celebrated them could expect. But my father persisted—in fact, he gave some of his finest sermons on holidays. But I can’t see how—”

Kreizler’s black eyes were positively alight as he held up a hand. “It’s a small point, I know, but I was curious.” Climbing up onto the surrey, Laszlo appeared to remember something. “Oh, and another detail.” Dury looked up expectantly as I joined Kreizler in the carriage. “Your brother, Japheth,” Laszlo went on. “At what point did he develop the—the difficulty in his face?”

“His spasms?” Dury answered, again puzzled by the question. “He always had them, to the best of my recollection. Perhaps not when he was an infant, but soon after that and for the rest of his—well, for as long as I knew him, at any rate.”

“They were constant?”

“Yes,” Dury said searching his memory. Then he smiled. “Except, of course, in the mountains. When he was trapping. Those eyes of his were as calm as a pond then.”

I wasn’t at all sure how many more revelations I could hear without bursting, but Kreizler took it all in stride. “A sad but in many ways remarkable boy,” he pronounced. “You wouldn’t have a photograph of him, I suppose?”

“He always refused to be photographed, Doctor—understandably.”

“Yes. Yes, I suppose so. Well, goodbye, Mr. Dury.”

We finally pulled away from the little farm. I turned to watch Adam Dury tread heavily back into the barn, his long, powerful legs and large, booted feet still sinking deep into the mire and refuse that surrounded the building. And then, just before he went inside, he stopped suddenly and turned quickly toward the road.

“Kreizler,” I said. “Did Sara mention there being anything about Japheth Dury’s tic in the newspaper stories about the family?”

“Not that I recall,” Kreizler answered, without turning around. “Why?”

“Because based on Adam Dury’s present expression, I’d say it
wasn’t
ever mentioned—and he’s just realized it. He’s going to have a tough time figuring out how we could’ve known.” Though my enthusiasm was still mounting, I tried hard to get it under control as I turned back around and declared, “Good God! Tell me, Kreizler—tell me we’ve got him! A lot of what that man said confuses the hell out of me, but please,
please
tell me that we’ve got a solution!”

Kreizler allowed himself to smile, and held up his right fist passionately. “We’ve got the pieces of one, John—that much I’m sure of. Perhaps not
all
the pieces, yet, and perhaps not correctly arranged—but yes, we have most of it! Driver! You may take us directly to the Back Bay Station! There is a 6:05 train to New York, as I remember—we must be on it!”

For what must have been miles we were full of scarcely coherent expressions of triumph and relief; and if I’d known how brief this feeling would be, I might have savored it more than I did. But an hour or so past the halfway point of our return trip to the Back Bay Station, a sound not unlike the short, sharp crack of a broken tree limb rang out in the distance, signaling the end of all exultation. I can distinctly remember the crack’s being immediately followed by a very short, hissing sort of sound; and then something slammed into the horse that was drawing our surrey, bringing a fountain of blood from the beast’s neck and knocking it stone-dead to the ground. Before the driver, Kreizler, or I could react there was another sharp crack and hiss, and then an inch or so of flesh was torn out of Laszlo’s upper right arm.

CHAPTER 35

W
ith a short cry and a long curse Kreizler spun to the floor of the surrey. Knowing that we were still badly exposed, I forced him to jump out of the carriage and then crawl underneath it, where we both pressed ourselves close to the ground. Our driver, by contrast, walked out and into the open, for the apparent purpose of studying his dead horse. I urged the man to get down; but the evident loss of future revenue had made him blind to his present safety, and he continued to make a tempting target out of himself—until, that is, another report sounded and a bullet whined into the ground near his feet. Looking up and suddenly comprehending the danger he was in, the driver took to his heels and made for some thick woods fifty yards behind us, on the opposite side of the road from a stand of trees that seemed to be harboring our assailant.

As he continued to seethe and swear oaths, Kreizler also managed to get his jacket off, following which he instructed me on how to minister to his wound. It didn’t appear as serious as it was messy—the bullet had just nicked the muscles of his upper arm—and the most important thing was to stop the bleeding. After removing my belt I fashioned it into a tourniquet just above the bleeding gash, and then drew it tight. Tearing Laszlo’s shirtsleeve, I made it into a bandage, and soon the crimson flow had ebbed. When a bullet crashed into the wheel of the surrey, however, shattering one of the thick spokes, I was reminded of how soon we might have other injuries to address.

“Where is he?” Kreizler said, scanning the trees in front of us.

“I saw some smoke, just left of that white birch,” I answered, pointing. “
Who
is he, is what I want to know.”

“I fear we have entirely too many possibilities to choose from,” Kreizler replied, tightening his bandage a bit and groaning as he did. “Our adversaries from New York would be the most obvious choice. Comstock’s authority and influence are quite
national.
”

“Long-range assassins don’t really seem like Comstock’s style, though. Or Byrnes’s, for that matter. What about Dury?”

“Dury?”

“Maybe that realization about the twitch changed his attitude—he may think we’re crossing him.”

“But did he really seem a murderer,” Kreizler asked, folding his arm and cradling it, “for all his violent talk? Besides, he made it sound as though he’s a decent shot—unlike this fellow.”

That gave me a thought: “What about…
him
? Our killer? He could’ve followed us from New York. And if it
is
Japheth Dury, remember that Adam said he never really took to shooting.”

Kreizler considered the idea as he continued to scan the woods, then shook his head. “You’re being fanciful, Moore. Why follow us here?”

“Because he knew where we were going. He knows where his brother lives, and that talking to Adam could help us track him down.”

Laszlo’s head kept shaking. “It’s too fantastic. It’s Comstock, I tell you—”

Another gunshot suddenly cut through the air, and then a bullet tore large shards of wood out of the side of the surrey.

“Point well taken,” I said, in answer to the bullet. “We can argue about all this later.” I turned to study the woods behind us. “Looks like the driver made it to those trees all right. Do you think you can run with that arm?”

Kreizler groaned once sharply. “As easily as I can lie here, damn it!”

I grabbed Laszlo’s jacket. “When you get into the open,” I said, “try not to run in a straight line.” We both turned and crawled to the other side of the carriage. “Keep your movements irregular. Go on ahead, and I’ll follow in case you have trouble.”

“I’ve a rather unsettling feeling,” Kreizler said, scanning the fifty yards of open space, “that such trouble is likely to be permanent, in this case.” That thought seemed to strike Laszlo hard. Just as he was about to take flight, he stopped and fingered his silver watch, then handed it to me. “Listen, John—on the chance that—well, I want you to give this to—”

I smiled and pushed the watch back at him. “A rank sentimentalist, just as I always suspected. Go on, you can give it to her yourself—move!”

Fifty yards of supposedly open northeastern terrain can seem a lot more difficult to cover than you might imagine when the stakes of the run are mortal. Every little rodent hole, ditch, puddle, root, and stone between the carriage and the woods became an almost insurmountable obstacle, my pounding heart having robbed my legs and feet of their usual agility. I suppose it took Kreizler and me somewhere under a minute to run the fifty yards to safety; and though we were apparently menaced by only a single gunman who didn’t have anything like expert aim, it felt as though we were in a full-scale battle. The air around my head seemed alive with bullets, though I don’t think more than three or four shots were actually taken at us; and by the time I completed the escape, with branches lashing at my face as I propelled myself further and further into the wooded darkness, I was as close to incontinent as I hope ever to be.

I found Kreizler propped up against an enormous fir tree. His bandage and tourniquet had loosened, allowing a new flow of blood to stream down his arm. After retightening both dressings I draped his jacket around his shoulders, for it seemed that he was growing cold and losing color.

“We’ll stay parallel to the road,” I said quietly, “until we catch sight of some traffic. We’re not far from Brookline, and we can get a lift to the station from there.”

I got Laszlo up and helped him start through the thick woods, keeping one eye on the road so that we never lost track of it. When we came within sight of the buildings of Brookline I figured it was safe to come out of the woods and move at a faster clip. Soon after we had, an ice van came by and drew to a halt, its driver jumping down to ask what had befallen us. I made up a story about a carriage accident, prompting the man to offer us a ride as far as the Back Bay Station. This proved a doubly fortunate stroke, for several large pieces of ice from the van driver’s stock eased the pain in Kreizler’s arm.

By the time the Back Bay Station came into view it was almost five-thirty, and the afternoon sunlight had begun to take on an amber, hazy quality. I asked our driver to let us off near a small stand of scraggly pines some two hundred yards from the station itself, and after we’d gotten off the van and thanked the man for his help and his ice, which had almost completely checked the flow of blood from Kreizler’s arm, I hustled Laszlo into the shadowy darkness beneath the deep green boughs.

“I’m as enamored of nature as the next man, Moore,” Kreizler said in confusion. “But this hardly seems the time. Why didn’t we drive to the station?”

“If that was one of Comstock and Byrnes’s men back there,” I answered, picking a spot among the pine needles that offered a good view of the station house, “he’ll probably guess that this is our next move. He may be waiting for us.”

“Ah,” Laszlo noised. “I see your point.” He crouched down on the pine needles, then began rearranging his bandage. “So we wait here, and then board the train unseen when it arrives.”

“Right,” I answered.

Kreizler drew out his silver watch. “Almost half an hour.”

I glanced over at him pointedly and smiled a bit. “Just enough time for you to explain that schoolboy gesture with your watch back there.”

Kreizler looked away quickly, and I was surprised by the extent to which the comment seemed to embarrass him. “There is,” he said, returning my smile despite himself, “no chance that you’ll forget that incident, I suppose?”

“None.”

He nodded. “I thought not.”

I sat down near him. “Well?” I said. “Are you going to marry the girl or not?”

Laszlo shrugged a bit. “I have—considered it.”

I let my head fall with a quiet laugh. “My God…marriage. Have you—well, you know—asked her?” Laszlo shook his head. “You might want to wait until the investigation’s over,” I said. “She’ll be more likely to agree.”

Kreizler looked puzzled at that. “Why?”

“Well,” I answered simply, “she’ll have proved her point, if you know what I mean. And be more amenable to tying herself down.”

“Point?” Kreizler said. “What point?”

“Laszlo,” I answered, lecturing him a bit, “in case you haven’t noticed, this whole affair means rather a lot to Sara.”

“Sara?”
he repeated in bewilderment—and by the way he said the name I realized just exactly how wrong I’d been since the very beginning.

“Oh, no,” I sighed. “It’s
not
Sara…”

Kreizler stared at me for a few more seconds, then leaned back, opened his mouth, and let out a deeper laugh than any I’d ever heard from him; deep, and irritatingly long.

“Kreizler,” I said contritely, after a full minute of this treatment. “Please, I hope you’ll—” He didn’t stop, however, at which annoyance began to come through in my voice. “Kreizler. Kreizler! All right, I’ve made a jackass out of myself. Now will you have the decency to shut up?”

But he didn’t. After another half-minute the laugh finally did begin to calm, but only because it was now causing some pain in his right arm. Holding that wounded limb, Laszlo continued to chuckle, tears appearing in his eyes. “I am sorry, Moore,” he finally said. “But what you must have been thinking—” And then another round of painful laughter.

“Well, what in hell was I
supposed
to think?” I demanded. “You’ve had enough time alone with her. And you said yourself—”

“But Sara has no interest in marriage,” Kreizler answered, finally getting himself under control. “She’s little enough interest in men at all—she’s constructed her entire life around the idea that a woman can live an independent, fulfilling existence. You ought to know that.”

“Well, it did cross my mind,” I lied, trying to salvage some vestige of dignity. “But the way that you were acting, it seemed as though—well, I don’t know how it seemed!”

“That was one of the first conversations I had with her,” Kreizler explained further. “There were to be no complications, she said—everything would be strictly professional.” Laszlo studied me as I pouted. “It must have been very trying for you,” he said, with another chuckle.

“It was,” I answered petulantly.

“You might’ve simply
asked.
”

“Well, Sara wasn’t the only one trying to be professional!” I protested, stamping a foot. “Though I can see now that I shouldn’t have bothered with any—” I suddenly stopped, my volume falling again. “Wait a minute. Just one minute. If it’s not Sara, then who in hell—” I turned slowly to Laszlo, and then he turned equally slowly to the ground: the explanation was all over his face. “Oh, my God,” I breathed. “It’s Mary, isn’t it?”

Kreizler looked toward the station, and then into the distance in the direction from which the train would approach us, as if searching for salvation from this inquisition. None came. “It’s a complicated situation, John,” he finally said. “I must ask you to understand and respect that.”

Too shocked to offer any commentary, I proceeded to sit mutely through Laszlo’s subsequent explanation of this “complicated situation.” Clearly there were aspects of the thing that disturbed him deeply: Mary had originally been a patient of his, after all, and there was always the danger that what she believed was affection for him was in reality a kind of gratitude and, worse still, respect. For this reason, Laszlo explained to me carefully, he’d tried very hard not to encourage her or to permit himself any reciprocal emotions when it had first become clear to him, almost a year earlier, how she felt. At the same time, he was anxious that I should understand how very much his and Mary’s mutual attraction had grown from beginnings that in many ways were perfectly natural.

When Kreizler first started to work with the illiterate and supposedly uncomprehending Mary, he quickly realized that he would not be able to communicate with her until he could establish a bond of trust. And he forged that bond by revealing to her what he now referred to ambiguously as his own “personal history.” Unaware that I currently knew more about his personal history than he’d ever told me, Kreizler didn’t realize how fully I understood his words. Mary had probably been, I speculated, the first person who ever heard the tale of Laszlo’s apparently violent relationship with his own father, and such a difficult disclosure would indeed have bred trust, and more: while Laszlo had only intended to encourage Mary to tell her own tale by telling his, he had, in fact, planted the seeds of an unusual sort of intimacy. That intimacy had survived into the period when Mary came to work for him, making life on Seventeenth Street far more interesting, not to mention perplexing, than it had ever been before. When it eventually became impossible for Kreizler to deny first that Mary’s feelings for him went beyond mere gratitude, and, second, that he was experiencing a similar attraction to her, he entered on a long period of self-examination, trying to determine if what he felt was not at heart a kind of pity for the unfortunate, lonely creature whom he’d taken under his roof. He only fully satisfied himself that it was not several days before our investigation burst in on his life. The case forced him to put off a resolution of his personal predicament; yet it also helped him clarify what form that resolution might take. For when it became clear that not only were the members of our team in physical danger, but his servants, as well, Kreizler experienced a desire to protect Mary that went far beyond the usual duties of a benefactor. At that point he decided that she should be told as little as possible about the case, and play no part in its prosecution: knowing that his enemies might come at him through the people he cared about, Laszlo hoped to safeguard Mary by making sure that, on the off chance some outsider found a way to communicate with her, she had no useful information to divulge. It hadn’t been until the morning of our departure for Washington that Kreizler had decided it might be time for his and Mary’s relationship to, as he rather awkwardly put it, “evolve.” He informed her immediately of this decision; and she watched him depart with tears in her eyes, fearful that something would happen to him while he was away and thus prevent their ever becoming more than master and servant.