anxious to avoid a scandal.
Littlemore showed the Sigels the letters from William Leon's trunk. They recognized the handwriting. The detective next showed them the silver pendant found on the dead girl and the hat with the bird on it. Neither Mr nor Mrs Sigel had ever seen these objects before — and indeed positively stated they did not belong to Elsie — but Mabel contradicted them. The pendant was hers; she had given it to Elsie in June.
Littlemore, drawing Mr Sigel aside, told the father he had better have a look at the body found in Leon's apartment. Downstairs in the morgue, Mr Sigel could not at first identify the corpse; it was too decayed. Somberly, he told the detective he would know the truth if he looked at the teeth; his daughter's left eye tooth pointed the wrong way. And so did that of the small decomposing body lying on the marble slab. 'It's her,' said Mr Sigel quietly.
When the two men returned to the waiting room, Mr Sigel cast a stony and accusing eye on his wife. The woman must have understood; she fell into convulsions. It took a long time to quiet her. Then her husband told the story.
Mrs Sigel did the Lord's work in Chinatown. For years she had toiled to convert the heathen Chinamen to Christianity. Last December, she had begun bringing Elsie with her to the mission house. Elsie had taken to the work with a passion that delighted her mother but disturbed her father. Despite Mr Sigel's strong disapproval, the girl was soon eagerly traveling on her own to Chinatown several times a week and teaching her own Sunday Bible classes. One of her most avid pupils, Mr Sigel recalled bitterly, had dared to call at their house a few months ago. Mr Sigel did not know his name. Littlemore showed him a photograph of William Leon; the father shut his eyes and nodded.
After the Sigels left the morgue, to endure as they might both their misery and their notoriety — newspapermen were already waiting outside — Detective Littlemore wondered where Mr Hugel was. Littlemore had assumed the coroner would have wanted to conduct the autopsy himself and to hear the Sigels' evidence. But the coroner was absent. Instead, one of his assistant physicians, Dr O'Hanlon, had examined the body. He informed Littlemore that Miss Sigel had been strangled to death, that she had been dead three to four weeks — and that Coroner Hugel was upstairs in his office, professing a complete lack of interest in the case.
Chapter Seventeen
The exquisite Clara Banwell, clad in a green dress matching her eyes, was undressing the equally exquisite, near desperate Nora Acton — quieting her, comforting her, reassuring her. Arriving at the house shortly after Littlemore's departure, Clara had gracefully ushered everyone out of Nora's bedroom, police and family alike. When Nora was naked, Clara drew her a cool bath and helped her step in. Nora, sobbing, begged Clara to let her speak: so many horrible things had happened.
Clara put two fingers to Nora's lips. 'Hush,' she said. 'Don't speak, darling. Close your eyes.'
Nora obeyed. Gently Clara bathed the girl, washed her hair, and dabbed her healing wounds with a smooth wet cloth.
'They don't believe me,' said Nora, holding back tears.
'I know. It's all right.' Clara tried to soothe the distraught girl. She asked Mrs Biggs, who was hovering anxiously in the hallway, to bring the ointment Dr Higginson left.
'Clara?'
'Yes.'
'Why didn't you come earlier?'
'Shh,' answered Clara, cooling Nora's brow. 'I'm here now.'
Later, after the bathwater drained away, Nora lay in the tub, her torso now draped with a white towel, her eyes closed. 'What are you doing to me, Clara?' she asked.
'Shaving you. We need to, to clean this awful burn. Besides, it will be prettier like this.' Clara placed Nora's hand protectively over the girl's most delicate spot. 'There,' she said. 'Press down, darling.' Clara placed her own strong hand atop Nora's, keeping a firm pressure and shifting position every now and then, so that she could do her work. 'Nora, George was with me all last night. The police asked me, and I had to tell them. You must tell them now. Otherwise they are going to take you away. They are already making arrangements with a sanatorium.'
'I shouldn't mind a sanatorium,' said Nora.
'Don't be silly. Wouldn't you rather come with me to the country? That is what we will do, darling. You and I, all by ourselves, just as we like. We can talk it all out there.' Clara finished her razor strokes. She applied to Nora's burn the soothing balm left by the doctor. 'But you must tell them.'
'What must I say?'
'Why, that you did all this to yourself. You were so angry at all of us: George, your mother and father, even me. You were trying to get back at us.'
'No, I could never be angry at you.'
'Oh, darling, nor I at you.' Clara turned her attention to the two lacerations on Nora's thighs. To these too she applied the doctor's ointment, moving her fingers in gentle circles. 'But you must tell them now. Tell them how sorry you are for everything. You will feel so much easier. And then you can come away with me for as long as you want.'
Even the coroner, a man of mercurial temperament, rarely passed from fury to exultation to despondency as quickly as he did when listening to Detective Littlemore's report of the events at the Acton house earlier that morning.
Littlemore had tried to interest the coroner in Elsie Sigel, but Hugel brushed the subject aside. The coroner had only heard about the hue and cry at the Actons' by accident, from one of the messenger boys. Hence his anger: why had they informed Littlemore but not himself? Then, hearing Nora's story, Hugel let out whoops of 'Ha!' and 'Now we have him!' and 'I told you, didn't I?' Finally, learning of the discovery of the lipstick, cigarettes, and whip secreted in the girl's bedroom, he slumped back into his chair.
'It's over,' said Hugel quietly. His face began to darken. 'The girl must be put away.'
'No, wait, Mr Hugel. Listen to this.' Littlemore told the coroner about the discovery of the tiepin.
Hugel barely registered the news. 'Too little, too late,' he said bitterly. He grunted in disgust. 'I believed everything she said. The girl must be put away, do you hear me?'
'You think she's crazy.'
The coroner took a deep breath. 'I congratulate you, Detective, on your razor-sharp logic. The Riverford- Acton case is now closed. Inform the mayor. I am not speaking to him.'
The detective blinked uncomprehendingly. 'You can't close the case, Mr Hugel.'
'There is no case,' said the coroner. 'I cannot prosecute a murder without a corpus delicti. Do you understand? No murder without a body. And I cannot prosecute an assault without an assault. Shall we indict Miss Acton for criminal assault on her own person?'
'Wait, Mr Hugel, I didn't even tell you. Remember the black-haired man? I found out where he went. First he goes to the Hotel Manhattan — how about that? — and then he goes to a cathouse on Fortieth Street. So I go to this cathouse myself, and the lady inside tips me off to Harry Thaw, who — '
'What are you talking about, Littlemore?'
'Harry Thaw, the guy who murdered Stanford White.'
'I know who Harry Thaw is,' said the coroner, with considerable self-restraint.
'You're not going to believe this, Mr Hugel, but if the Chinaman's not the killer, I think Harry Thaw might be our guy.'
'Harry Thaw.'
'He got off, remember? Beat the rap,' said Littlemore. 'Well, at his trial, there was this affidavit from his wife, and — '
'Are you going to bring Harry Houdini into it as well?'
'Houdini? Houdini s the escape artist, Mr Hugel.'
'I know who Houdini is,' said the coroner, very quietly.
'Why would I bring him into it?' asked Littlemore.
