He toweled off and looked at the clock. Eleven-twenty already and he’d not reported in, but who was watching? He often worked the street, checked with snitches, talked to the neighborhood vendors, merchants, tavern owners to learn what was up, and who was doing what to whom, and how often and where and when, and in the end why. So no one would think it strange that he’d not checked in, and if anyone needed him, they could ring the bell or make a call now, as he’d had a phone installed.
He found clean clothes, a nice suit not slept in. A glance at his pocket watch on the end of its fob told him it was half past noon, and his stomach concurred. He wandered out and down the street to Mirabella’s, a German restaurant with outside tables and chairs. Along the way, he’d picked up a copy of the latest Chicago Tribune, seeing that its headline screamed news of the double murder at the lagoon alongside a photo depicting the flaming boat at the tunnel entrance.
Some Johnny-on-the-spot reporter had caught the sight moments before police doused the flames. No doubt whoever the photographer was, he’d collected a fine reward for the startling shot. But nowhere in the frame could a killer be found.
Once seated with a beer in hand, Thom Carmichael stood over him and declared, “Tribune’s behind the Herald! Take a look at a real scoop!” He dropped his paper onto Ransom’s table, the headline screaming: arrest made in world’s CITY FOR RANSOM
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fair phantom case. A logline below this read: “Chief Nathan Kohler nabs suspected multiple murderer.” This made Ransom sit up and almost spill his beer. “An arrest made? By Kohler?” People at other tables overheard. The more curious waited to hear more.
“Appears Kohler’s scored big. For the sake of the city and future victims, I pray it is a good arrest, but I have me doubts, Alastair.”
But Alastair only half heard as his rage erupted on reading the name of the accused: Philo Keane.
Cursing Kohler, Ransom stood, swilled the last of his beer, tossed down a coin, and rushed for the station house, shouting back, “Where’re they holding Philo? Bloody fools!
And why didn’t you get this news to me sooner?”
“Your own house, of course! Des Plaines lockup—the Bridewell. The story’s selling newspapers!”
When he got to the station house, she was there—Dr. Jane Francis, but dressed as Tewes. “Whatever are you doing here like this? I thought once your ruse was up, that you’d’ve the decency to—”
“I came to plead your case with Kohler, but Kohler is out for your head, you fool, and you go about as if he were manageable. And meanwhile, people around the two of you get hurt.”
“Hurt. You speak to me of hurt?”
Police around them began to look askance. What must the lads be making of this, he wondered. “Don’t dare put yourself between Nathan and me,” he said, leading her down a set of steps to a basement area that housed cold case files. “It can only get you trouble beyond your imaginings.” “Alastair, you’ve not said a word about when we were children together.”
“Children . . . you and me?”
“For a brief time, we shared the same teacher, Mrs.
Ornery, my father called her.”
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“Mrs. Onar?” he asked.
“Then you do recall the mad Mrs. Onar?”
“She kept a whiskey bottle in her bottom left drawer. Yes, I recall her.”
“Good, then you must recall little Jane? Little Jane Francis? Me!”
“I remember the dour old teacher, but you. Francis . . .
Jane Francis, I . . . I’m sorry.”
“I was pulled from the school, put in St. Albans, as Father could not abide Mrs. Onar and her rules and her lack of imagination and human compassion.”
“The milk of kindness she never knew.”
“My father was Dr. William Francis. You must remember him?”
“Not a whole lot about those years I’ve chosen to remember.”
“I never forgot you. You were instantly kind to me. You rescued me.”
“Rescued?”
“There was a bully named Evan . . . Evan Kingsbury.”
“Sorry . . . don’t recall him either.”
There lingered an awkward moment of silence during which their eyes met. He quickly broke off eye contact and said, “So explain to me now why . . . why all this charade, this living a lie?”
“Economic need mostly. People won’t go to a female doctor, unless, I suppose there is no other. I had thought to go westward—”
“California?”
“But there’s little hope of good medical schools out west for Gabby, so . . . so . . .”
“So you concocted an even crazier notion?”
“It would’ve served me well but for Nathan.”
“But how did he find you out when—”
“When you found it impossible?”
“Hold on. I was onto you . . . after a while.”
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“Yes, after I confessed.” She began to laugh.
He looked piqued at her laughter, then angry eyed, then he was fighting back his own laugh until he could contain it no more.
People heard their laughter rising up the stairwell, bouncing off stone walls.
When settled, he slapped open the Herald’s headline.
“Have you seen this? Damn fools’ve arrested Philo Keane for the murders?”
“Keane? No! Isn’t he the fellow with the enormous tripod at the train station?” She scanned the news account. “Says here he knew two of the victims intimately. Chesley Mandor and Polly Pete.”
“No, Philo paid them for posing.”
“Intimates, he took more than their picture according to—”
“Bloody Carmichael will write anything if he thinks it’d sell a paper. I first met Merielle from one of Philo’s photos, and it was Philo who set me on a path of having her.”
“She had a very different version of events. Alastair, she felt as indentured to you as she did to Jervis. She had a problem with men.”
“But I tell you, Philo would never harm a woman.”
“Perhaps.”
“Nathan Kohler is trying to bait me and using people I care about to do it, and he’s doing a fine job of it. He used you, now Philo. Who’s next? Who is safe? Only those who distance themselves from me as Griffin has done.” “Drimmer?”
“According to the paper, Drimmer assisted Kohler in the arrest.”
While further scanning the newspaper, she said, “They must’ve had some provocation, some proof to move on the man . . . I mean police act only if they have something to go on. I mean to raid his home and arrest him.” “I know of many a case where men’ve been sent off to prison on flimsy evidence, foolish assumptions, prejudices, 268
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wrong conclusions, nonsense beaten out of a suspect when all else fails. I also know of cases in which a man was put to death on eyewitness accounts that later proved false.”
“If you believe in Mr. Keane’s innocence, then you must fight for him.”
“Have to see what they have concluded. Why they targeted Philo.”
“He’ll need a lawyer.”
“A good Chicago lawyer, one who knows every loophole.”
“I know just the man. Malachi Quintin McCumbler.”