easily cross it.”
“You’re probably right. But on that night at the Egyptian Hall, I saw how she’d changed. Her time spent with Whitlock had driven her illusions away. She now understood that she’d no reason to fear or despise me. But instead, she’d begun to despise herself.”
“And in consequence she abandoned all that was proper, and chose a life of moral decay. Haven’t your inquiries confirmed as much? She considers herself lost.”
“She can believe it, but that does not make it true. What I saw was a woman worth saving. She could forgive me, but she would not forgive herself. Tell me, Inspector. Is that the sign of a bankrupt soul?”
“Call me Sebastian,” his host said. “Or Becker, if you must. I am an inspector no longer.”
“I believe that she’s only held to her choice by the life she now leads and the company she keeps. Whitlock’s servants may try to teach her the ways of the damned. But it’s my belief that her nature will temper the excesses of the fiend they would guide her to become.”
“Nature can be beaten,” Sebastian said. “I once had to deal with a man who’d drowned himself. He put stones in his pockets, to make sure that his will to die would prevail over his instinct to survive. If she’s determined to see herself damned, there’s nothing you can do that will stop her.”
“I’ll have to find her to know,” Sayers said.
Sebastian went on to recount his own experiences in the aftermath of that momentous evening at the Egyptian Hall. He’d made the profound error of telling his story in full to the Metropolitan Police, without even thinking of how it might be received. In retrospect, he should have censored himself. They listened attentively at first, as officers to an equal. Then they began exchanging glances. Then they moved to another room to discuss what they had heard.
His account was deemed unsatisfactory. None of the well-heeled witnesses ever came forward. The watchman who’d admitted the audience confirmed that they’d existed, but said that their printed invitations had carried no names. When Sebastian was finally allowed to return home, he was suspended from duty and required to appear before a tribunal.
In the days before the tribunal, Sebastian went back to church. He did not pray, but spent several hours discussing myths and miracles with Father Alexander.
Father Alexander could teach others that Christ had risen, while declining to argue whether an intelligent person should allow that a rotten corpse might reverse its decay, heal its injuries, and clamber to its feet. For the priest, God was not hiding in the impossible tricks, but was to be found somewhere in the act of accepting them.
That was of little help to Sebastian. A readiness to believe in wonders might make the believer holy, but it didn’t make the wonders true.
The tribunal had recommended his dismissal from the force, the reason to be recorded in the remarks column of the police register as “want of sobriety and contradicting himself in his evidence.” Becker’s new superintendent had persuaded the chief constable to amend this to read, “…in consequence of his health.” The original wording would have kept him out of a job in this, his second life. The character of a Pinkerton operative had to be above reproach, with only those of strict moral principles and good habits being permitted to enter the service.
The time came for Sebastian to leave for the office. Sayers went to thank his hostess. He was awkward, she was gracious, and her sister and the boy sat in embarrassed silence while this rough-hewn stranger took up space in their familiar little room.
Then he joined Sebastian and they walked from the house to the streetcar, and rode it into town. The day was warm, and its windows were lowered to let a breeze pass through the carriage as they moved. Sayers sat with his elbow over the ledge and mused, “A Pinkerton man.”
“It’s like being a policeman,” Sebastian said. “Except that people respect you and you make a living.”
“If I walked into your office and asked you to find Louise for me, could you do it?”
“Could you afford us?”
That seemed unlikely. Sayers was patently not prosperous, and the years had not been kind. Steady drinking and regular poundings in the boxing booths had affected his bearing. Sebastian had not actually seen him take any drink during the few hours that they’d spent in each other’s company, but the need would probably catch up with him soon.
Sayers said, “I’ve tracked her up and down this country. She knows I’m looking for her. Once I came this close.” He held up one hand with his thumb and forefinger held barely apart.
Sebastian said, “Do you know how she lives?”
“Performing, singing…in Pittsburgh, she gave dancing lessons. She’s a widow when it suits her. She has an eye on society. I think she’d like to settle in one place. But there’s always some reason for her to move on.”
The streetcar reached Sebastian’s regular stop, and they squeezed their way out through all the standing passengers to disembark.
“Sayers,” Sebastian said when they were on the sidewalk and heading toward the Pinkerton offices, “I’m grateful for the answers to questions that have been haunting me for more than a decade. But this life you still lead is the life I left behind. I’ve no wish to return to it.”
“With such a wife and such a home,” Sayers said, “I’d be astonished to hear otherwise. All you have is all that I envy.”
“Then understand. I’ll see what I can find in the office files. Be our guest for a day or two, and we’ll get a few good meals down you, see if we can put a spring in your step and a shine on your shoes. If you need money…”
“I’ll take no money from you,” Sayers said. “But I’ll be grateful for your hospitality. And if anything in the Pinkerton files can bring me closer to Louise, then I’ll be on my way and you’ll hear nothing more of me. Will I need to pay your employers for the information? That could be a problem.”
“I’m an assistant supervisor. I’m expected to pursue new business. Not everything turns into a paying case. That’s expected, as long as it’s all within reason.”
The building’s war-veteran janitor had brought a chair out onto the sidewalk, pretending to look out for a delivery while he was really just taking the air. He’d seen the slaughter at Antietam, they said. Now he just watched the living go by.
“If anyone should ask you, you’re a client,” Sebastian told Sayers, and led the way into the entrance hall.
TWENTY-EIGHT
The paragraph in a corner on Chapter 2 of the
Louise had used the name of Mary D’Alroy in Richmond some years before, and had resumed it on her return. As far as this part of the South was concerned, she was well on her way to becoming a respectable performer with a verifiable past—one that could be supported by local sources, at least. Elsewhere in this vast nation she’d moved under other, similarly established names.
It was still a dangerous life. A man from San Antonio had recognized her in Chicago, and she’d had to spin him a story. Almost any other profession would have been safer to follow, but she had to make a living and support two servants, and knew of no other way. She could not sew, or cook, or do any other womanly thing of practical use. And the stage offered advantages that no other kind of living could; who but a certain kind of theatrical could arrive in a new city, offer a demure demeanor and a program of high-minded readings, and within a matter of days be on first-name terms with ladies from the best families in town? The
After the matinee, the audience moved out into the foyer. Those with tickets for the reception gathered in
