Escape Artist

Theo hurriedly glanced at his watch, mumbled something to his brother, and told us all goodbye. “I’m off to meet a friend.” He walked off the stage.

Gustave Timm was sputtering some gibberish about my talent as a writer.

Hmm. The homely girl as wordsmith; the drudge as hawker for his melodramas. Cinderella’s stepsister turning pieces of coal into words of diamonds.

Houdini obviously enjoyed the flash fire exchange, which bothered me. Was I overreacting? I was hurt, not only by Theo’s insensitive dismissal of me as a future actress but by Gustave Timm’s ready agreement with him, though perhaps he was just making idle chatter. A word came to mind, one to be added to my list of deadly sins: shallow. A cousin to boring and annoying. Pride and greed and lust and the other deadly sins were the stuff of literature- and classical theater. The niggling little petty vices were the ones that rankled and were thus especially unpardonable.

Gustave hurriedly changed the subject. “Miss Ferber, I saw you talking to that strange man who lives in my brother’s rooming house.”

“Mac?”

“I hadn’t realized you knew him-worked with him. He’s quite the oddity. He talks to no one in the house, even stares down the formidable Mrs. Zeller.” He mock shivered. “Everyone is quite scared of him.”

Well, so was I, but I declared, “He’s a highly accomplished printer.”

Gustave squinted. “Really?”

“We all have our idiosyncrasies, sir.” I waited a second. “Unfortunately, Mr. Timm, I overheard you squabbling with your brother while I was in Mrs. Zeller’s parlor. The walls are thin…”

He turned red in the face. “What?”

“I was surprised to learn that he’s planning on leaving the high school.” I spoke rapidly, purposely defiant, violating whatever tacit laws of privacy I believed in. I wanted to annoy now, to goad. Prick my vanity and I’m hell bent on revenge.

Good for me.

Gustave Timm looked lost for a minute. “That’s not definite, Miss Ferber…and not for publication. I’m hoping you’ll honor that.” He sighed. “What you heard was brotherly rivalry. My brother has been shattered by his wife’s illness and…and estrangement…and has been paralyzed. I actually took this job at the Lyceum to be near him.” His voice rose. “I’ve come to love Appleton. I have a life with Mildred now. And to spite me-it has nothing to do with his failed marriage-he says he wants to leave. He’s playing a game and…” He held up both hands. “Enough. What you heard was private. I don’t know why you have to bring it up now.”

Because I want to irritate you. “Well, you seem to want to provide a detailed explanation.”

He shook his head. “Touche, Miss Ferber. It’s a failure I have. My brother Homer is the taciturn one, the tombstone in the graveyard. I’m the chattering magpie, running on and on…”

“I was just curious.” I shrugged. “I’m a reporter.”

“Surely…”

“This is not news…Yet.”

“Homer is not leaving Appleton.”

“All right, then. But this is what the citizens of Appleton will want to know.”

“Please.”

For some reason Gustave glanced at Houdini. “I’ve said too much. I’m protective of my brother, even as we do battle.”

Houdini looked into the wings. “My brother Theo and I have our problems, I’ll be the first to tell you. He’s my shadow, you know. He even does his own show under the stage name Hardeen, but it’s a pale reflection of mine, and so…well…he runs off to talk about me with his friends…” He frowned. “While I yammer about him to you.”

I thought of Fannie. She was my sister and I would defend her, even though we argued. I did love her. She was my blood. I supposed someday, should we cross paths one time too many, especially with her frilly Cinderella posturings, I’d have to kill her. Deputy Moss would fumble with the leg irons…and wither under my tongue- lashing.

“We have to go,” I said. Esther had been frowning at my sniping at Theo and Gustave Timm. “I’m headed home. I promised my father a walk.”

“I’ll walk you both home.” Houdini moved toward me.

“Of course not. I’ve told you before…”

“There’s a murderer afoot in Appleton,” Houdini said, his tone a little too flippant. Esther and I gasped. Gustave Timm looked at him, befuddled. He sucked in his cheeks. “Oh, Lord, I’m sorry, that was careless of me. I choose the wrong words. My English is poor…Sometimes I speak…”

“No,” I agreed, “you’re right. But I walk the streets of Appleton all the time. People know me.”

“I only meant…” Houdini’s craggy face got soft. “I think of that poor girl. A girl just like you two. Young.”

No one knew where to look. Gustave Timm cleared his throat and checked his watch.

“Thank you.” I broke the awful silence. “But I can find my way home.”

Quietly, tension still in the air, we walked off the stage.

While Gustave locked up the theater, we lingered in front of the marquee that still bore Houdini’s name. A life-sized poster of Houdini filled the display case by the entrance, and I noticed Houdini checking his image. At that moment a plum-colored Victoria paused in front of the theater, the two majestic horses neighing noisily, and we turned to see Cyrus P. Powell, reins in hand, staring at us.

Gustave, flummoxed, dropped his keys, but Houdini half-bowed, European-style, ready to speak. Mr. Powell’s censorious eyes swept from me to Esther, then to Houdini, and he said through clenched teeth, “A private show at my theater?”

The rich man’s voice had a metallic, whistling timbre, so much like nails pulled across a school slate.

But in the next instant, he turned to his horses, and the Victoria moved away.

“He’s not happy with me,” Gustave mumbled.

“I doubt whether he’s happy with himself,” I chimed in, and I caught Houdini grinning at me.

Houdini said he was ready for a nap and planned to head back to David Baum’s house. Esther was meeting her mother at a friend’s two streets over, and began her generous goodbyes, which rivaled the farewell scene from some Italian opera. Houdini kissed her hand. I walked with Houdini and Gustave, but Houdini turned off at Oneida Street. Gustave and I continued on, and I purposely made peace with him, the two of us talking animatedly about Mabel Hite’s recent performance in A Knight for a Day. I thought her acting strained, the famous actress “underplaying the needed comedy.”

Gustave’s face brightened. “God, yes. You know, I thought the same thing.” I smiled at him; we were friends again. He added quickly, “I do think you should convince Sam Ryan to let you do theater reviews. I’ve read your news pieces. I’m not just saying that.”

“I’m lucky if I have a job next week.”

He seemed surprised and concerned. “Tell me.”

But suddenly Houdini was calling from behind us, returning. “Miss Ferber, let me walk you home.”

“I told you, sir, I’m safe in Appleton. This isn’t New York’s tenderloin district.”

“I need to ask you something.”

“What?”

“Let’s walk. It’s beautiful out.”

As the three of us walked along, Houdini wove an elaborate question about the differences between European and American audiences, and whether I thought-as someone who went to the theater regularly-he came off as a bumpkin with his rough accent, his boasting, and his faulty grammar. “You write for a living. Bess tells me to watch my speech. I just don’t know.” He looked me in the eye. “When you get famous, sometimes it’s hard to step backward to learn what you should have learned…” He faltered. “Sometimes I say ain’t and sometimes I say youse, and I know the audience thinks I’m a fool. In Europe it don’t matter. To them I’m a crazy American with my tenement-house gab. But here I notice people laughing. The other night, in my hometown, I said youse guys, and I saw some folks shake their heads.”

He didn’t wait for me to answer nor did he seem to care. His monologue was spirited and amiable…and a