Sirens Page 14

  They’re calling it “the lost battalion,” the 77th.

  Little do they know.

  January 20

  Will I ever feel normal again?

  April 10

  Went to Coney Island. Love the beach there, even when it’s cold. The sea, especially when it’s calm, reminds me of the prairie, reminds me of that summer, of the time before.

  Made me feel better.

  May 1

  Rushton’s made good on his promise. Gave me a heck of a nice position. Moving to New York to start up. Sad to have to leave Josie, but seems to me I’m making her sad all the time, anyhow. Maybe the city will pick me up.

  May 15

  Job with Rushton going okay, now I’ve settled in. Uncle Bert and Aunt Mary are genereous to let me live with them. Rushton’s okay, even if he’s rich.

  Which is the hard part. Everything’s changed. I’ve changed. I think about Willie O., who talked about how his folks were spat on when they arrived from Ireland. How his pop couldn’t find a job, how they called him a dumb paddy.

  You know, that son of a dumb paddy took a bullet—for what? For freedom? Whose freedom? John Rushton and his rich-guy friends?

  May 17

  I’m concerned for Melody. Tried to tell her not to grow up too fast, but she’s a looker and knows it. She flirts and carries on. Sneaks out at night. Chester too young to be a help; I’ve taken to following her when I can, keeping an eye on her.

  June 2

  Josie came into town. Took her to the museum, to my favorites. I felt sorry later that I was such a wet blanket, but memories crept up on me.

  I gripped the cover of the journal tight, remembering that day.

  June 5

  Went to a meeting today. Liked what I heard. About time these guys made themselves heard.

  Bolshevicks? Nah. Just poor blokes needing a job, a voice, any voice.

  July 20

  Not sure I agree now with everything that’s being said. Feeling like I need to lay low, ’cause some of what they want to do I can’t buy into.

  Still…it’s rough out there for the Irish, the Italians, the Jews. “Give me your tired, your poor….” Sure, right. Just shut the door behind you, and be sure to lock it and keep out the riff-raff, those funny-accented blokes.

  September 10

  Everyone’s astir with Melody’s situation. I should’ve been there. The one time I wasn’t.

  November 1

  A solution has been found, but Melody will pay the consequences forever. And I will, too, because I made a deal that cost me. But I had to. She’s family. I thought I was turning it all around. I thought I’d never have to play that role again.

  This other business has gotten dangerous. I’m beginning to suspect their plan will hurt people. Don’t like it and have decided not to play that game any longer. I may sympathize with these guys, but I’m not willing to do what they’re asking.

  And if John Rushton ever found out what I know, how I’m—

  The page ended, at the bottom, in midsentence.

  What was this? I flipped back and forth, trying to decipher what had happened, careful not to let the loose pages fall and scatter. The following pages looked like they had been removed, so the rest of the entry and those that followed for some months were missing.

  I felt the sweat bead on my forehead as I searched, and then it caught my eye, a note in a different ink, written sideways in the margin on the last page before the missing ones. The note read:

  J. Loved those library lions. First time.

  What?

  I leaned back against the dresser. What was this? What happened to Mel? Who was going to find out what? What business had he gotten mixed up in?

  And what was with the note that was clearly addressed to me?

  The library lions: Teddy had to mean the New York Public Library. He took me there on one of our first trips into town. We had such a time, and afterward we went for ice cream and then a matinee.

  He wanted me to go back to the library.

  I lifted the journal and turned to the next written page. The entries went to odd things, tallying personal accounts, items of clothing purchased. Nothing else was revealed in those pages about Teddy’s “deal,” or the consequences, or Melody, or what plan Teddy disapproved of that had “gotten dangerous.”

  I closed the journal. What had happened to Melody? What did Teddy have to do and what was he hiding from Rushton?

  The missing pages that held the answers. The library lions were a clue.

  I sat on my bed and looked around these lovely quarters. My aunt and uncle were invisible, keeping their status as upper-middle-class respectables; I thought about others around me who were invisible, busy with labor, slaving after the likes of the Cateses. And me, now.

  I thought about what Teddy had said about those who needed a voice.

  Like Malcolm, who served me and tried to make me comfortable when he himself was not. Or Joey, who should be in school, not filling his days with the mindless, endless up and down, up and down in a vertical carriage for wealthy clients. Or Ed, who braved whatever weather just to open a door and act pleasant, no matter what abuse he suffered. What did I know about them, these three, about their dreams and hopes?

  What did I really know about my own? Rich man, poor man, beggar man, thief: everyone’s equal in joy and sorrow. Melody’s misery could not be assuaged by all the pretty dresses Manhattan could provide. Money does not buy happiness.

  I was now of a mind to think that whatever the missing secret in Teddy’s journal was, it had put him in some real danger, and that’s why those pages were missing.

  I put the journal aside, wanting to find those missing pages. A trip to the library was in order, but it would have to wait until morning.

  When Ed buzzed from the lobby, I was alone at the breakfast table, planning my library trip. Malcolm called me to the intercom.

  “It’s Mr. Charles O’Keefe, miss.” Ed’s voice came through all tinny; I had to strain to hear when he lowered it to a near whisper. “I think he works for that Mr. Connor.”

  “You’re right, Ed, he does. I’m surprised he’s here, honestly.” I tapped my foot. “Well, I’ve just finished breakfast, so send him on up.”

  I greeted Charlie as he stepped out of the elevator. Joey, his large ears sticking out from under his cap and his wide eyes watching me, peered around Charlie. Poor thing, he was dying of curiosity. Me, nearly alone in the apartment with a young man my age? Quite a thing to gab about, even if Joey had seen Melody’s doings all these years. Joey slid the door shut slowly, leaning over farther and farther, until I was afraid he’d catch his nose in the gap.

  Charlie stood in the foyer, shifting from one foot to the other.

  I put my hands on my hips. I hadn’t forgiven nor forgotten that he might still be Daniel Connor’s stool pigeon. I said, my voice caustic, “Well, you can’t be spying for Danny Connor now, can you? I mean, you’re out in the open, coming here.”

  He sounded unhappy as he blurted, “I won’t be following you like that anymore. Forget all the secrecy. I’m here to invite you to his house.”

  “Invite me!” I dropped my hands. “When?”

  “Right now. This minute. The car is waiting.”

  My stomach clenched right along with my fists. “And if I don’t want to go?”

  Charlie shrugged, his eyes on the floor, his hands playing with his cap. “Mr. Connor said I was to come and pick you up.”

  “Honestly, Charlie.” I shook my head. “Connor may be your boss, but he isn’t mine.”

  His eyes met mine. “Please, Jo. He’ll have my head if I don’t bring you round right now.” He shifted again, sounding miserable as he said, “I’d never see you again, that’s for sure.”

  I heaved a big sigh. I couldn’t let Charlie get into trouble on my account. And the thought of never seeing him again brought a lump to my throat, despite my suspicions. I thought about my new idea, the one that made me shudder: I had to
make Connor like me. Wrap him around my little finger, if I could. And then beg him to leave my family alone.

  I felt a cold chill at the thought, and this time I shuddered visibly. Charlie looked up at me with those dark moon eyes.

  Maybe I’d been wrong in my suspicions about Charlie. I hoped I had been. But that didn’t mean I had to be warm, especially when I was scared to death. “Fine. Let me get my things.”

  I combed my hair and applied lipstick, then stepped back and regarded myself in the mirror. No, that wouldn’t do. It would send Daniel Connor too far in the direction of the wrong idea. For a second I wondered what idea I’d like to send to Danny Connor. I still wasn’t sure myself. But I rubbed the lipstick off as best I could, pulled on my cloche and a lightweight summer jacket that covered my shoulders and otherwise bare arms, and found Charlie, who was standing awkwardly right where I’d left him.

  If I’d known Connor lived on the north shore of Long Island, I would’ve put up more of a fuss. The drive to Great Neck took about thirty minutes. As we crossed the Queensboro Bridge the sunlight sparked off the water, and boats plied the river, gulls hovering and diving. Charlie insisted on sitting up front with Sam; I guessed it was because he didn’t want to talk to me, or maybe he was nervous about what Connor would say if he saw the two of us together in the back of the limo. I tried to relax into the leather seat, even though I felt like a prisoner. I kept wishing Charlie’d sat in the back with me; I think I would have clutched his hand, if I’d been able to forgive him.

  Once we reached the island the road narrowed to almost a country lane, and we wove in and out along the shoreline. Scrub roses clambered around the edges of the dunes that were festooned by bunch grasses standing up like tufts of hair on an otherwise bald pate. The water of Long Island Sound beyond rippled with whitecaps.

  This was not a place I wanted to be.

  Connor’s estate was fenced and gated in iron. Sam opened the gate, and we drove up a winding drive. Statuary lined the drive: marble fawns, nymphs, elves, plus plinths and urns. Along one stretch a series of columns stood like somber sentinels linked by a chain of carved ivy garlands. Marble whatnots were crowded along the entire length of our passage.

  I couldn’t imagine anything more garish. Until I saw the house.

  It was brick, with eight three-story white fluted columns along the front. Vast wings of rooms angled back to either side, away from the curving drive. A fountain in the middle of the circular drive sported grinning cupid upon leering cupid pouring water in endless cascades from buckets and bowls. The fountain rose so high I arched my neck; it was half again as tall as the house.

  “Oh, good grief,” I said.

  Charlie came around and opened the back door and extended his hand to help me out of the auto. He stood back. “Pretty amazing, isn’t it?”

  “It’s more than amazing.” I couldn’t blame Charlie for being awed, but I was appalled.

  I followed Charlie up the steps to the main entrance. The butler answered the door—at which point I was treated to further extravagant displays.

  The door opened into a great hallway, and the butler left us standing in the middle of the hall, at the foot of a broad stair. More statuary. Paintings from floor to high ceiling, and where there weren’t framed paintings, painted murals covered the walls. And flowers decorated every available surface—fresh flowers, with scents so heady I thought I might be sick from the sweetness.

  It was the most awful house I’d ever seen.

  “You ain’t seen nothing yet,” Charlie whispered. “Just wait till you see his collections of antiquities and oddball Egyptian stuff, that museum. And the greenhouse, just wait.”

  I compared this monstrosity to the apartment on Park Avenue. My aunt and uncle had done up their new home in such a lean, spare style that it lacked any personality; it felt nothing like home, and it had no heart. Connor’s house was the opposite: an overabundance that spoke of trying to fill a void, for this palace held no more homely warmth than my aunt and uncle’s apartment.

  My own home, for all its lack of modern conveniences, for its small size and peeling paint and stained wallpaper, it had been a place of warmth and love. Until the war. Until Teddy. Until Pops thought he was missing something, and became angry and bitter, filling his own emptiness with ill-gotten gains. I missed my homely house. I’d rather have it any day, even in the face of Pops’s wrath, than the cold and sterile tomb holding my aunt and uncle and cousins, or than the treasure store, the dragon’s hoard, that lay here.

  But I didn’t have long to contemplate this spectacle. Daniel Connor emerged from the room to our right. He nodded his head, and when our eyes met, I felt that I was in the presence of a predator.

  He smiled, all teeth, white and straight despite his boxing days. Money can buy almost anything, I thought. His steel eyes glinted; I thought again of light reflecting off water, or off of chains.

  He reached for my hand, and my mouth went dry as he took my fingers and bent and brushed them with a kiss. I did not yank my hand away. I had to remember my new purpose: to make him like me. To make him leave Pops and Teddy alone.

  “I’m so happy you’re here,” he said, straightening.

  As if I’d had a choice.

  CHAPTER 25

  Lou

  I watched from the upstairs window as Charlie helped her out of the limo. I was just getting dressed. She looked at the fountain and the house, and even from that distance I could see she was pretty knocked off her feet by what she saw.

  That was the way I’d felt, when Danny brought me out there the first time. It was right after he’d bought the place. He got it from a rich country-club snob type who had tons of initials in his name but no dough in his wallet. The bum hadn’t even stayed to show Danny around, just sold it and took off for France or Florida or someplace. Anyhow, Danny’d finally bought it around 1921, and then he brought me out there, keeping the Algonquin for times in town. He was having to do a bunch of decorating, ’cause the snobby bum had left it just empty and plain. But Danny, he’d started filling it lickety-split, once he had the keys in his hand. Crates were busting out all over the place, crates filled with sawdust packed around these objects Danny collected.

  Not that Danny ever went anywhere to do the collecting; he had people for that. The only thing Danny collected himself was me.

  Until she stepped out of that car, younger than me and prettier. Sweet and innocent and knocked off her feet by Danny and his house. I saw it all, knew what it was all about. At the time, watching out the window, I twisted the silk sash of my robe so tight I put a little rip in it. Which is what made me cry, when I heard the rip.

  I really liked that robe, that pink silk. Danny’d bought it for me just after we met when he took me shopping at Macy’s, and I really liked that robe a lot.

  CHAPTER 26

  MAY 24, 1925

  ALPHONSE CAPONE

  Second Hand Furniture Dealer

  —Business cards printed for Al Capone as he set up shop in Chicago, 1920

  Jo

  Connor wasted no time taking me on a grand tour of his house. But first he dismissed a disappointed Charlie. I turned back and caught Charlie’s eye as I followed Connor down the vast hallway that split the house; my insides were squirrely as my only friend—at least, I hoped Charlie was still a friend, even after all this—disappeared when we turned a corner, me with Connor.

  I was on dangerous ground now, playing a delicate high-wire act.

  We walked through room after room, downstairs, upstairs. I stopped keeping count after a while. They were each different, as if Connor was displaying archetypes of decor. Here was a room decorated in black and white; there was a room with rosebuds on every surface—wallpaper, fabric, carpets—and finished with vases filled with rosebuds. I couldn’t imagine the cost of the fresh flowers alone.

  As we passed through a second-story bedroom dressed all in yellow (with an arching frieze of golden putti angels fluttering overhead) Connor froz
e. On the table sat a vase of daffodils, tulips, and coreopsis, but they were wilting, the petal edges brown, and I watched as his face went dark. He picked up the vase, porcelain, gilded, and he strode to the nearest window, opened it, and pitched the entire thing out—vase, flowers, and all. I heard the vase smash on the paving below.

  I sucked in my breath. Heaven forbid if I ever wilted in front of Daniel Connor.

  Charlie hadn’t even come close about the museum, which formed one entire ground-floor wing of the mansion. As I stepped inside, right then I began to see Daniel Connor in a new light. I wasn’t sure if he was a genius or insane, but what he did with his money was something else.

  The room was huge—about the size of my high school gymnasium—all white, with high clerestory windows to let in only indirect light. There were two sets of huge double doors: the pair through which we entered from the house and a matching pair at the far end of the room. Most pieces were displayed in glass cases on white pedestals. It was arranged, Connor explained, in a particular order, more or less by age from oldest artifact to youngest, with one notable exception at the far end—his most precious Egyptian piece, he said. As I walked through these displays, I thought of all the museum directors who’d love to get their hands on Connor’s collection.