The Girl in the Glass (13 page)

"What do you want?" she said in a nasty tone.

"Which way to Paradise?" asked Antony.

She opened the door wider and beckoned for us to enter. Her look of anger melted into a smile, and she said, "Get in here, Henry Bruhl."

Once we were standing inside a dimly lit foyer and the door had been closed and locked, Antony leaned over and kissed the woman's wrinkled cheek. She then turned to Schell and said, "How are you, Tom?"

"Pleasure to see you again, Grace," he said. He lifted her hand and kissed it.

"Still full of shit, I see," she said.

"At your service," said Schell.

She turned to me and eyed me up and down, focusing on my turban. "Who's this, Genghis Khan?" she asked, holding her hand out to me.

"This here is Ondoo," said Antony. "He's a swami."

"Halloween isn't till the end of the month," she said and grabbed my hand and squeezed it.

"Nice to meet you," I said.

"Is this your boy, Thomas?" she asked Schell.

He nodded.

"God help you," she said to me.

"We're looking for The Worm," said Antony.

"Well, you know, he's always either here or over at the library. You're in luck, 'cause he's back there right now, three sheets to the wind and diddling some Columbia professor's wallet."

"Thanks," said Schell.

"I'll bring you back a round of drinks," she said.

We left the foyer and walked down a dark hallway that ended in a short downward flight of steps. The place had obviously been the basement of an old warehouse; the bricks of the walls were crooked, and some had fused together over time. The stairs led to a large expanse crammed with tables and booths beneath a low ceiling of thick wooden timbers. There were candles on the tables and one electric light behind a makeshift bar made of sawhorses and old doors, covered with tablecloths. It was still early in the afternoon, and besides the bartender, who sat on a chair behind the bar, there were only three or four other customers.

I followed Antony and Schell toward one of the booths in the shadows of a rear corner of the room. As we drew closer, I could see the booth held two men sitting across from each other.

"Emmet," said Schell, "when you're done, we'd like to do some business." The man he was addressing, whom I supposed was "The Worm," waved and said, "Hey, Tommy, give me another minute here." He had a bushy gray beard and wore a rumpled overcoat, tattered hat, and fingerless gloves, like some kind of hobo.

We waited while he finished talking to the other man, who was as neatly dressed as The Worm was slovenly. The fellow in the suit, tie, and small circular glasses finally stood up, reached into his pocket, and handed over a wad of bills to The Worm. Then he lifted his hat off the table, placed it on his head, and walked away.

"Okay, you guys, the shop is open," said the hobo.

Antony and I took the bench across the table from Schell and his odd acquaintance. I was introduced to the man and learned his name was Emmet Brogan. Schell gave him a brief run-down on my story, to which he nodded and said, "A swami, nice touch."

"How's New York these days?" asked Schell.

"Well," said Brogan, "they kicked Walker out at the start of last month. He's off in Europe spending all the money he bilked from the citizens of the fair metropolis. La Guardia's in. The usual ball of crap keeps spinning. Same old, same old."

"Has business been good?" asked Antony.

"Business is always good," said Brogan. "Information's more valuable than gold." Grace appeared, carrying a tray, and set four drinks on the table. Schell handed her a bill, which she crumpled and stashed in her apron. "Drink up, boys," she said before retreating back into the shadows. I took a sip from my glass, expecting it to be beer. Whatever it was lit a fire in my mouth and throat, and I coughed.

"Business is good, but the coffin varnish never gets any better," said Brogan, downing a sizable gulp.

"What is this?" I asked Antony.

"Bathtub gin," he said, taking a sip.

An image of the old lady, Grace, sitting in a tub of the stuff, came into my mind, and I couldn't shake it.

"Grain alcohol with a mixture of
special ingredients
, so to speak," said Brogan. "Drink enough of this shit and it'll make you go blind. I'm surprised I can still see."

"Two questions for you today," said Schell, turning to The Worm.

"I'll give you one for free," said Brogan. "I'm in a good mood 'cause the Yanks won."

"What's a dybbuk?" asked Schell.

"A dybbuk?" said Brogan. "Hold on a second." He sat as if thinking, staring into the distance. "Hey, Henry, you got a cigarette?" he said.

Antony took two from his pack, put both between his lips, and lit them. He handed one across the table. The Worm nodded his thanks, took a long drag, and went back to thinking.

While we waited, Schell tapped my arm to draw my attention. "Emmet's mind is like a camera. Whatever he reads, he can eventually remember like it's sitting right in front of him," he said.

"A dybbuk," said Brogan, obviously smiling with pride at Schell's description of his powers. "It's Jewish. Hebrew occult."

"Is it a ghost?" asked Antony.

"Not exactly," said Brogan. "I remember now. It's a kind of demon. When the spirit of a dead person, wicked, of course, enters and controls the body of a living person, you get a dybbuk. In the folklore, when this happens, the spirit's out to harm the living in some way."

"Jewish you said?" said Schell.

"Yeah, definitely," said Brogan.

Schell nodded. "Okay, here's the second question," he said. He looked at me. "Diego, do you have the drawing?"

I reached into my vest pocket and took out a square of paper. Unfolding it, I laid it on the table and smoothed down the creases. On it was the symbol I had rendered from my memory of the cloth draped over Charlotte Barnes. I pushed it across the table toward The Worm.

"Oh, I know this," he said. He tapped the paper with his index finger, and with his free hand lifted the glass to his mouth. "Yeah." He nodded to himself.

"I thought it might be religious," said Schell, "because of the crosses."

"You could say that," said Brogan. "This is from the Klan."

"What clan?" asked Antony.

"There's only one Klan," said Brogan. "The Ku Klux Klan."

"The Klan?" said Schell. "This came from out on the island."

"No shit," said The Worm. "The Klan was all over the island a few years back."

"I had no idea," said Schell.

"June 1923, over twenty-five-thousand people gathered in a huge field to hear the message of the Klan," said Brogan. "Guess where? We're not talking Alabama, we're not talking South Carolina or Mississippi."

Schell and Antony shook their heads.

"East Islip, Long Island," he said and slapped the tabletop. "Sure, I did a whole workup on this stuff for a guy from the federal government a few years ago. One out of every seven or eight people on the island belonged. White hoods, burning crosses, the works."

"In my traveling show days down south, we heard about colored men being lynched by them," said Antony.

"This was a
new
type of Klan. They were still race haters, but they sold themselves to the populace on the platform of law and order. Imagine. There weren't enough colored people out there on the island for them to get that worked up about, so they kind of transferred their energy into hating the Catholics, the Jews, the immigrants. They were down on what they considered the dissolution of the white race by all of the foreigners coming into this country. And they were heavy supporters of Prohibition." Brogan lifted his glass, as if making a toast, and took a drink.

"What part of the island were they located in?" asked Schell.

"All over the damn place. They formed these little bands to guard the shoreline against bootleggers and would prevent them from landing. Shoot-outs, lot of violence there. White supremacy is what they've always been about, and that's basically what they're still about. Eventually, their own political infighting undercut their power. By the end of the twenties a lot of it disbanded, but I'm sure it's still there. There were times during their heyday, we're talking less than ten years ago, when they'd be allowed in churches and schools to give speeches, hoods and all. Lot of pastors were big supporters. Some shameful shit."

"That's a scary group," said Antony.

"Scary, yeah," said Brogan, "but mostly just a bunch of ignoramuses. There's guys a lot scarier than them out there."

"Who's that?" I asked.

"Guys with the same philosophy, but with real power, brains, and money. I hate to say it, my friend, but you'd be mincemeat with these bastards whether you were a swami or…where are you from, Guatemala? Mexico? Anyway, you'd be finished."

"Why the teardrop?" I asked.

"That's no teardrop, chum. That's a drop of blood. It's all in the blood. Their big fear is the mixing of the white race with, quote, unquote, inferior blood."

MURDER AT A PARTY

S
chell paid The Worm, who thanked him kindly and used some of the money to order another round of drinks. I passed, my first still unfinished. For a few minutes, Schell and Brogan exchanged facts about butterflies, and then the conversation moved on to acquaintances and old times, and Antony jumped in. Before we left, Schell inquired as to a name, someone he could contact on Long Island who might have been or still was seriously involved with the Klan.

Emmet went through his usual thinking phase where you could envision him flipping through the stored pages in his mind. "Of the klaverns that haven't broken up, they've all pretty much gone underground. I remember reading about a guy who was a big deal with this mess. Stephen Andrews. He's an old guy, might be dead by now. He was out in Freeport. Check out this title he had—he was a Grand Exalted Cyclops. I suppose in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. He might still be around. If he is, and he'll talk to you, you might be able to get some more out of him." Antony, Schell, and I stood up, and Emmet slid over to the edge of the booth to shake each of our hands. "Great to see you guys again," he said.

"I may be back for some more," said Schell.

"If you need to get something quick, call the library and leave a message for me at the desk. They all know me."

Brogan bummed one more cigarette off Antony and then turned to me and said, "Listen, son, the future's in information. That's where the money and power are going to be. By the time your kids reach your age, they'll have machines that do what I do. And they'll be free. Only one problem."

"What will that be?" I asked.

He waved a hand in the air. "Don't worry about it. First we have to get through the next war." We bid good-bye to Grace, who told us to come back and see her soon. Then we were out in the alley.

"Brogan's crazy as a loon," said Antony as we traced a path around the ash cans and junk.

"Yeah," said Schell. "He knows his facts, but when he starts to talk about the future, it's time to inquire as to how many of those piss gins he's consumed."

"I guess they call him The Worm because he's a bookworm?" I said.

"No, kid, they call him The Worm because he's a fucking worm," said Antony.

"What do you mean?"

"Can you imagine hanging around with that guy for any length of time? He's murder at a party."

"Emmet can't turn it off," said Schell. "The world to him is merely an accretion of facts. After a while, he burrows under your skin, and you just want him to shut up. Hence, The Worm."

"Does he live in a freight car or something?" I asked.

"He's got a place up on Park Avenue. Nice place," said Schell. "You wouldn't believe the people who hire him. The guy has dough."

"He dresses like a bum," I said.

"Life of the mind," said Antony.

After leaving Grace's Paradise, we went back to the station and caught the two o'clock train out to Port Washington. For the first part of the journey, no one spoke, but after Jamaica, Schell bent forward, resting his elbows on his knees, his hands clasped together, and said, "Why would the Klan want to kill Barnes's daughter?"

Antony and I sat there in silence, waiting for the answer.

"Well, if the Klan killed her," said Schell, "considering it was a group, and a group with a political agenda, no matter how screwed up, I'd say it would have to be either revenge for something or to make a statement. Otherwise, why leave a calling card? Obviously, the girl couldn't have done anything to warrant it."

"Does the mother's use of the term 'dybbuk' indicate that she's Jewish?" I asked.

"I'm wondering about that," said Schell. "Not necessarily, but it's a strong possibility."

"So maybe they killed the girl because she was half-Jewish?" I asked.

"Why, though? There's a good-size population of Jews on Long Island. Why pick this girl?" asked Schell.

"Emmet said they don't like the blood to mix," said Antony. "Maybe, like the kid said, it was because she was half-Jewish."

"But Barnes and his wife didn't seem really up-front about her being a Jew. I'd bet in that blueblood landscape he travels, that's not the best advertisement. If she is, most people don't know, so how would the Klan find out?"

"What do you want the guy to do, put an ad in the paper? Headline: 'My Wife's a Jew,'" said Antony. Schell cocked his head to the side and vaguely nodded. "Good point. It just doesn't seem to make sense, though. From what Emmet said, it doesn't wash with the law-and-order façade of the Long Island Klan."

"There's one other thing," I said.

Schell looked over at me and sat up straight.

"The hat?" asked Antony.

I nodded.

"Okay, go ahead. We'd have to spill it sooner or later," he said.

"What hat?" asked Schell.

"Remember that hat I wore when I was Parks's mother?" asked Antony. Schell nodded.

Even though he'd told me to relate the story, the big man jumped in and proceeded to lay out the entire adventure of the hat, our attempts to recover it, and our overall deceit. As much as I cringed as Schell told the tale, I was thankful to Antony for ending with the statement, "Don't blame the kid, Boss. I put him up to it."