Daniel Stashower - The Dime Museum Murders

Her eyes welled with tears. "I do not know what I can tell you, Theodore. We were eating our supper when the police came to the door. Such a racket! They dragged Josef away in a wagon. I was down at the police station for two hours, but I could learn nothing. Nothing that made sense, at any rate. They say he killed a man! My Josef, a murderer! He won't even lay traps for the rats, this is how big a murderer he is!"

"Did you know Branford Wintour?" Harry asked.

"Our best customer," Mrs. Graff said. "Although he doesn't come to the shop anymore. Josef goes to see him whenever something special comes along. Mr, Wintour has always been a perfect-no! Is that who Josef is supposed to have killed? Ridiculous!"

"Have you seen Mr. Wintour lately?" I asked. "No. But his man-what is his name?-Phillips, I believe. Phillips has been here three times in the past week." She gripped a corner of her shawl and twisted it around her fingers. "Mr. Wintour, dead? This is terrible news. How did he die?"

"I'm not entirely certain," Harry said. "Did your husband have a special deal brewing with Mr. Wintour? Was he handling something very unusual?"

She nodded. "He was quite secretive about it, Ehrich, but I know there was a very special item involved and that he expected to earn a large commission. He said he was going to buy me a winter coat."

"Do you have any idea what the item might have been?" "No."

"Did you ever see the man who was selling it?" "A queer bird. He would only come to the shop at night. I never saw him." "Never?"

"No. Josef always asked me to wait upstairs when he came."

"I see. Tell me, Mrs. Graff, have you ever heard of Le Fant ф meT?

"No." She looked at Harry's face and then at mine. "Ehrich, why are you asking me these questions? What is Le Fant ф me?"

Harry glanced at me, uncertain.

"We don't wish to alarm you unnecessarily, Mrs. Graff," I said.

"You don't wish to alarm me? My husband is in jail! How could I be more alarmed?''

"Very well," Harry said. "Your husband sold Mr. Wintour a very rare automaton called Le Fant ф me. The police believe that this automaton shot Mr. Wintour with a poisoned dart."

Mrs. Graff narrowed her eyes at us. "Ehrich, you are joking with me. Theodore, this is not a time for your jokes."

Harry said nothing. I looked at my shoes.

Mrs. Graff's hands went to her cheeks. "Can they be serious? This is why the police have arrested Josef? A poison dart?"

"So it would seem," Harry said. "Your husband is a suspect because he sold the device to Mr. Wintour."

"A poison dart?" she repeated. "A gun, I could understand. A knife, maybe. A poison dart? It does not seem possible!"

Harry began pacing in front of a case of wooden whirly-gigs. "I have demonstrated to the police that the automaton could not have fired the dart, but they have not seen fit to release your husband. Apparently I failed to convince them."

"Harry," I said, "they only wanted to confirm it for themselves. I told you this before."

"No, no," he said. "The police will only find some other means of laying this crime on Mr. Graff's doorstep. We must find the true killer and bring him to justice!"

"Find the true killer? Harry, you're a dime museum magician! What do you know about tracking down killers?" I had been hoping to inject a note of moderation into the proceedings, but Harry had already moved on to his next rhetorical high note.

"The police have not reckoned with the talents of the Great Houdini!" he cried, thrusting his index finger under my nose. "'I will comb this city and roust the evildoers wherever they may lurk! I shall be the scourge of the underworld! Those who-"

"Harry," I said quietly. "Why don't we let someone else become the scourge of the underworld? It'll be enough if we can convince the police of Mr. Graff's innocence."

Mrs. Graff gave a nod of assent. "I just want Josef home again."

"As you wish," Harry said. He took Mrs. Graff's hand and pressed it to his lips. "I shail not fail you, dear lady." He flung his astrakhan cloak around his shoulders. "Come along, Dash! We have a rendezvous with justice!"

Mrs. Graff looked at me and gave a bewildered shrug. "You'd better hurry along, then," she said.

We left the shop and Harry said nothing more until we had worked our way along Delancy Street to the thirteenth precinct station house. As we climbed the marble steps I noticed Harry fumbling in his back pocket. "Just a moment, Dash," he said. "Oh, that's all right, then." He pushed open the heavy wooden doors.

A gray-haired sergeant sat behind the dispatcher's desk. "Can I help you gentle-why, Mr. Houdini! Is that you?"

"Good evening, Sergeant O'Donnell," said Harry. "May I introduce the brother of the Great Houdini?"

"Call me Dash," I said. '"The brother of the Great Houdini' sounds so formal."

"Nice to meet you," O'Donnell said. "So, Houdini, are you here to go another round in the lockup?''

"If you wouldn't mind, Sergeant. Practice makes perfect."

O'Donnell saw the expression on my face and laughed. "You mean he didn't tell you? Your brother has been coming down here for the past three weeks to get himself locked up in our hoosegow."

"Late at night," Harry explained, "so as not to attract attention."

"I thought you wanted attention," I said. "Why have I been breaking my back to get you locked up at Sing-Sing if you didn't want attention?"

"Practice, Dash. The holding cells here were built on the same pattern as those at Sing-Sing."

A uniformed officer wandered past and gave Harry a companionable nod. "So you're a regular down here, is that it?" I asked. "Is that why those officers at the Win-tour mansion seemed to recognize you?"

"I suppose so," Harry said, "although I dare say some of them recognized me from the stage at Huber's." "Oh, undoubtedly," I said. "It's a wonder they didn't ask for autographs."

O'Donnell had pulled out a heavy binder and was flipping through the pages. "You're in luck," he said. "We've only got two guests in there at the moment, and I don't suppose either one will give us any trouble. One's a drunk, and the other's supposed to be a murderer, but he don't look like any murderer I ever saw."

"A murderer?" Harry asked with feigned alarm. "Are you sure it's safe?"

"That old bird won't bother you any. Hasn't said a word since they brought him down from interrogation. Just sits real quiet like. Caught him crying when I made my rounds."

"Well, I suppose it will be all right then," Harry said. "You don't mind if my brother comes along? He's going to time me with his fancy watch."

"Why should I mind?" asked O'Donnell, pulling a heavy ring of keys from a desk drawer. "Follow me, gentlemen."

He led us down a set of dank steel-beam steps to a metal-studded door with a heavy iron crossbar. He lifted the bar and fitted a large key into a reinforced panel-lock, turning it three times clockwise. The door rolled open on rusty casters, and O'Donnell held it as we passed through, sliding it shut behind us once we were inside.

The lockup was comprised of only four cells, two on each side, with a wide corridor running down the center. Four bare lightbulbs dangling from ceiling cords provided the only illumination. It took only a glance to see why the warden at Sing-Sing felt so confident about his escape-proof cells. I'd seen my brother pick his way through some of the toughest, most heavily warded padlocks ever designed, but the locks on these cells were beyond his reach-literally. The prison architects had rigged up a sort of extended hasp, so that the lock wasn't actually seated into the cell door at all. Instead, it was bolted onto the wall a good six feet away, securing a metal cross-beam tight against the cell door. From inside the cell, the prisoner would have no way of reaching the lock. Harry's skill and practice were useless here-he simply would not be able to get his hands on the lock.