"So you say," said Schell.
"Whatever theory you've got cooking is bullshit, mister. The Klan's finished here on the island. Been finished for some time. You've got little groups here and there, glorified social clubs where the only thing burning is hot air. I'm not going to live much longer, and to tell you the truth, I don't mind. This country's going down the toilet. You've got all kinds of heathens mixing in here. The blood of our nation is corrupted to the point of being poisoned. That socialist dupe, FDR, is going to get into office, lift Prohibition, and then you'll see. Straight to the bottom."
Schell stood up. "Thanks for the hospitality, Mr. Andrews," he said. "It's been a pleasure."
"You better hope I never find out who you are," said the old man.
"I'm the Exalted Cyclops," said Antony, releasing the trigger of the gun. Calvin had come back to consciousness and was lying motionless, eyes wide with fear. The big man stood up, holstered the gun, and stepped away from him.
Once we were back in the car and driving away, Antony said, "Pleasant fella, that Andrews."
"You guys scared the hell out of me back there," I said. "I almost puked."
"There's all kinds of cons," said Schell.
"Do you believe him?" I asked.
"I think so, which means whoever killed Charlotte Barnes is working their own scam. We'll see."
THIS CASE IS CLOSED
After we'd gone to see Andrews, our pursuit of Charlotte Barnes's killer hit a stone wall. Schell judged the situation as still too hot to interview the other people on the list or go back to her father's estate to try to glean more clues, the Klan deal seemed to be a dead end, and Lydia Hush had melted like the snow queen she was.
Schell resumed his zombie act, drinking too much at night, and I tried to return to my studies. The days were beautiful and clear and the nights were long. All of our hours were underscored by the magisterial dirges the boss spun on his Victrola. Antony, proclaiming himself "bored shitless," fled to the city to spend two days with Vonda, the Rubber Lady.
On the morning he returned on the early train, he entered the kitchen and threw a folded newspaper onto the breakfast table so that it landed faceup, the headline showing. He took his coat off, hung it on the back of his chair, and said, "According to the cops, this case is closed." He tossed his hat onto the counter and headed for the stove.
Schell and I, who had been wearily sipping coffee, sat up and focused on the words-"Arrest Made in Barnes Case." The big man returned to the table and sat down with his cup.
"What's the dope?" asked Schell. "My eyes aren't awake enough to read yet."
"They picked up a guy, Frederick Kern, a hophead, connections to the Klan, a record of minor burglaries-one for assaulting an off-duty cop in a bar some years back. He's done some time, a couple of months here and there. The cops tell, I think for the first time, that the girl was found with that Klan rag. They say the cause of death was strangulation. The story they're telling is that Kern was a nut job on a lone mission to revive the local Klan. He picked on Barnes, because, as they put it in the article, back in the twenties it was falsely believed by the Klan that Barnes was behind a good deal of the rum-running on the North Shore. Of course, they go on to say that Barnes had been cleared of these false allegations a long time ago. I love what money can do."
"Do you buy it?" I asked.
Antony shook his head.
"Obviously a railroad job," said Schell. "No doubt Kern's a lowlife, probably not all that smart. They needed a quick arrest in this case, so they went through their files after finding out about the symbol, came up with this loser, and dragged him in. Case closed. Everybody looks good."
"I'd love for this to be over," said Antony, "but I have to agree with you, Boss. This reeks."
"Strangulation," said Schell. He looked over at me. "Do you remember any marks on the girl's neck when you found the body? There'd be bruises."
Now that some time had passed, I was able to think back to the image of the body without feeling I was going to get the dry heaves. I steeled myself and let the image come into my mind. "The light wasn't good," I said, "but what I remember is that she was very pale and that was it. No marks, no bruises."
"I don't remember marks around the neck," said Antony. "But like I told you before, I was in a hurry to get out of there."
"Maybe we could take that fed badge and papers I lifted off that guy a few years ago in Penn Station and put it to good use here," said Schell. "We go visit the coroner and tell him there's an investigation going on above the level of the local cops and see if we can get him to spill something. If he can prove to me she was strangled, I'll reconsider and drop the whole thing."
"Not a bad…" Antony started to speak, but at that instant the phone in the office next to the kitchen rang.
While Schell went to answer the phone, I asked Antony what Schell had meant when he'd referred to Penn Station.
"Oh, that," he said. "We were signed up to do a sйance for this rich old hermit in the city. The guy's life was a real mystery, murder to find anything we could use when we did the job. Schell was desperate for information on the guy. We knew some people who could tell us a few things, but he'd paid them off really well or had scared them into keeping their mouths shut.
"Anyway, we decided we needed to pose as cops in order to get them to sing. We were in Penn Station talking about it, and right there, we spotted this guy. We knew he was a bull, undercover. I mean he was the flattest flatfoot you ever saw. Anyway, we worked out a plan. We passed by the guy, arguing. I pushed Schell, he bumped into the guy, apologized profusely, et cetera. The guy was going to say something but takes one look at me, and I give him my bear wrestling stare, and he lets it go. We walk away, and Schell, of course, has the guy's wallet. When we opened it later, we found out he wasn't a cop, though. He was a federal agent, FBI."
"What happened with the rich old hermit?" I asked.
"The fucking guy died before we could jerk his chain. If we were ever going to see him again, it would have to have been at someone else's sйance."
"Have you used the FBI stuff since then?"
"No, it's not the kind of thing you want to play with if you don't have to. Posing as an agent carries a stiff sentence. If those guys catch wind of a scam, they'll find you by hook or by crook. We let it sit after that."
Schell came back into the kitchen. "Okay, gentlemen, let's move. Ten minutes, in the car. I've got a line on something good," he said. He'd already turned and started down the hall to his room to get dressed when I called after him, asking what it was.
"Lydia Hush," he called back.
No more than ten minutes later, Antony had the Cord rumbling at an idle, and Schell and I got in.
"Where to, Boss?" asked Antony.
"Head down toward Syosset," he said, "then take Berryhill Road to Eastwoods going west."
Once we were on our way, I asked Schell if he'd spoken to Lydia Hush.
"No, not her. It was Tremaine. He just got back from a stint in Philadelphia."
"Who's Tremaine?" I asked.
"Abel Tremaine, King of the Cold Readers," said Antony. "The guy's a real pro, smoother than a gin shit."
"He said he'd been meaning to call me for a while," said Schell, "but that it had slipped his mind, and then he had to take off for a job in Philly. Anyway, he just got back last night and he remembered. He said this guy in the business, Lester Brill, had called him a while ago and asked about us, wanted to know whether we could be trusted, etc. So Abel tells the guy he knows us and that we're trustworthy. Answers a few questions, you know, professional courtesy. Told him we had Diego working with us now and so on. You know how Tremaine likes to talk."