Caleb Carr - The Angel Of Darkness

“At last!” Mr. Picton said, smoking and gnawing on his pipe like one of the more nerve-racked types I’d occasionally seen during the Doctor’s visits to Bellevue Hospital’s Insane Pavilion in New York. “I was afraid that if you didn’t arrive soon these three were going to physically assault me and take the telegram! But fair is fair, that’s what I told them-the Doctor and Stevie deserve to hear the news at the same time as everyone else!”

“Please,” the Doctor said breathlessly, ignoring Mr. Picton’s kindly consideration, “go ahead…”

“The wire arrived at just past six,” Mr. Picton said, setting his pipe aside for the moment and adjusting himself nervously in his chair. “And it’s my hope that together we can make more sense of it than I’ve been able to do alone. I’ll just read it to you-” He unfolded the thing with a loud flutter, then cleared his smoky throat and proceeded:

“MR. RUPERT PICTON, BALLSTON SPA COURT HOUSE, BALLSTON SPA. URGENT . L.H. DECLINES RIGHT TO APPEAR BEFORE G. JURY, REFERS STATE TO HER AFFIDAVIT AT TIME OF CRIME. NOTHING MORE TO ADD. LOCATED REV. PARKER YESTERDAY. ALIVE, THOUGH NOT UNDAMAGED. WILL TESTIFY IF GUARANTEED PROTECTION. MICAH HUNTER DIED YESTERDAY OF MORPHINE OVERDOSE. CORONER SAYS SELF-INFLICTED, BUT CAT IS NOW OUT OF BAG. TWO LOCAL COPS ACCOMPANIED CORONER, L.H. KNOWS THERE IS NO OFFICIAL POLICE INVESTIGATION INTO HER ACTIVITIES. DUSTERS NOW TOO DANGEROUS FOR US TO REMAIN ON WATCH. ALMOST KILLED TAILING HER AS SHE MOVED A.L. TO THEIR PLACE. TRYING TO ARRANGE FOR EYES ON THE INSIDE. VANDERBILT BACK IN TOWN. L.H. WENT TO HIM IN FULL MOURNING. V. HAS ENGAGED CHICAGO LAWYER TO ASSIST IN HER DEFENSE. MARCUS DEPARTED LAST NIGHT TO FIND OUT WHO MAN IS. I RETURN BY NEXT AVAILABLE TRAIN. WOULD APPRECIATE TRANSPORT AND LARGE WHISKEY AT STATION. MOORE.

“And that, my friends,” Mr. Picton said, taking his pipe back up, “is the sum of things. I’ve checked the timetables-John should be arriving at about eleven, though of course there’ll be delays. Which gives us several hours in which to figure out just what he’s talking about.” Mr. Picton waved the telegram above his head. “Some of it’s obvious, of course, and none too surprising-I didn’t honestly expect Libby to show up for the grand jury proceedings, for instance. But there are other elements that are quite confusing.”

The Doctor got up and reached toward the telegram. “May I?”

“Oh, yes, of course, Doctor,” Mr. Picton answered, handing the thing over. “You’ve known John far longer than I have, after all, so perhaps you’ll do better with some of his vague references-starting with the statement that Reverend Parker is ‘alive but not undamaged.’ ”

“Either Moore was simply demonstrating his usual clarity of language,” the Doctor answered in what you might call a dry tone of voice, scanning the piece of paper, “or he didn’t want to take the chance that anyone might get hold of a copy of the message. Vanderbilt’s reappearance, looked at in such a light, is somewhat sinister.”

“Yes,” Lucius agreed. “There’s not a lot his people wouldn’t be able to find out, if they had a mind to.”

“I’d be willing to bet,” Miss Howard said, “that the business about Parker means that Libby did sic the Dusters on him at some point. If John and Marcus could find him, she must’ve been able to also. And God knows what shape he ended up in.”

Cyrus shook his head. “Bad enough to make his life a genuine misery, I expect, miss,” he said quietly. “Maybe bad enough to make him wish he was dead. It might be that she’d take more satisfaction from that than from actually having him killed.”

Miss Howard gave Cyrus a grim look what indicated she agreed with him; the Doctor, too, nodded. “Yes,” he said, still studying the telegram, “but a more permanent solution was apparently necessary for Micah Hunter. That, too, is understandable. He probably never knew anything about what happened up here before he married Libby-but when Marcus brought the news about the grand jury, Hunter doubtless began to suspect the truth. And it wouldn’t have been much work, even for his drug-ridden brain, to draw the obvious inferences about the ill-fated children his wife had been ‘attending to’ in New York.”

Mr. Picton cocked his head, with something that almost looked like respect in his face. “Killing him’s a clever tactic for the trial, too. Libby’ll now arrive in the clothing of a recent widow who spent years nursing a Civil War veteran.” His look of strange admiration suddenly turned into a wince. “My God, what a depressing thought. Judges, juries, and the public are prone enough to side with a woman during a trial-but the grieving widow of a Union soldier… nothing like a black dress and the flag to bring out sympathy. But tell me, Doctor-what does Moore mean when he says he’s ‘trying to arrange for eyes on the inside’?”

“It relates to yet another clever move on our antagonist’s part, I’m afraid,” the Doctor replied. “I had hoped that, if summoned to Ballston Spa, she would arrange for some temporary caretaker to look after Ana in her house.”

“And why would that have helped our cause?” Mr. Picton asked.

“It wouldn’t,” the Doctor answered. “Not in terms of the trial, at any rate. But in the event that we fail, and she’s acquitted-”

“Then she’d have to get rid of that caretaker on returning to New York,” Lucius finished for him with a nod, grabbing hold of the idea. “And with any luck, we could’ve been there to catch her in the act and prevent it.”

“Or if we failed in that attempt, we would at least have had-and I do not mean to sound excessively callous, here-another murder which we might have attempted to lay at her door,” the Doctor said. “Now, however, knowing that the police are not in fact investigating her, she can be far bolder-Moore says that they actually saw her transferring the child to the Dusters’ headquarters, a place the police do not frequent without the strongest of motivations.” Pausing, the Doctor focused his eyes more sharply on the telegram. “I’d say that John is endeavoring to find someone within, or at least close to, the Dusters who will be willing to keep watch over Ana-for if we should succeed in convicting Libby, the child’s fate will be sealed unless we have inside help.”

“But-who could he possibly contact?” Lucius said. “I mean, even approaching anybody who’s known to frequent that place would get him a broken skull.”

At that point I became aware of a pair of eyes fixing on mine, and looked over to see Cyrus staring at me. “Not necessarily,” he said gently; and as he did, my own heart sank with the realization of what-or who- he was talking about.

“What do you mean, Cyrus?” Miss Howard asked. “Who could he possibly-” Following Cyrus’s gaze and looking at me, Miss Howard suddenly caught on. The Doctor and Lucius also glanced my way, knowingly and uncomfortably.

All of this attention caused me to start shifting my feet. “But-” I said quietly. “But-she’s gone.” My heart beating faster by the second, I soon found it impossible to keep my voice down. “She’s gone !She went to California-”

“We don’t know that, Stevie,” the Doctor said evenly. “And there doesn’t seem to be anyone else that Moore could possibly be referring to.”

I’d started to shake my head even before he’d finished talking. “No,” I said, in an effort to convince myself, as much as anyone else. “She left , she’s gone!” But then I remembered the glimpse of Ding Dong I’d caught on the Twenty-second Street pier before our departure from the city, and my voice died away as I realized that my argument wasn’t worth the air it took to voice it.