Stolen Away

dishy secretary seemed just a secretary.

He closed his eyes, slowly moved his hands down from his forehead until his palms were flat against his stomach. He began breathing deeply, rhythmically.

Then the secretary and the wife bowed their heads and began to pray or meditate or something. This was our cue to turn our own thoughts inward, I supposed. Breckinridge looked at me blankly and I shrugged and he shrugged, and we looked toward the now apparently slumbering Cayce.

He sighed deeply. Then his breathing became light and soft, as if he were taking a quiet nap.

Mrs. Cayce repeated something, which Breckinridge and I could not hear, but took to be the hypnotic suggestion that would trigger the “reading.”

I got out my pencil and notebook; what the hell-I was here.

Cayce began to mumble. He seemed to be repeating his wife’s incantation.

Then he damn near shouted, and both Breckinridge and I jumped, a little, in our hardwood chairs. Tough on the tailbone.

“Can you give us the exact location of the missing child,” Mrs. Cayce asked him gently, “at the present hour- and can you describe the surest way to restore the child unharmed to his parents?”

“There are many channels through which contacting may be done,” he said, in a clear, normal voice. “These are the channels that are acquainted best with the nature of racketeering. These individuals are part new, partly not new to such rackets-see? That is, one who has been in the employ of such-the others, entirely new.”

In that gibberish, it struck me, was what might be a grain of truth: experienced racketeers working with somebody recruited from the inside at the Lindbergh house.

Mrs. Cayce tried again. “What means should be used to communicate with the kidnappers?”

“There are already many in motion. Someone who may make arrangements or agreements, for the release or return without injury to the baby, would be best.”

That was brilliant.

“Is it possible to get the names of these people?”

“The leader of authority of the group is Maglio.”

Maglio? I knew of a Maglio: Paul Maglio, sometimes known as Paul Ricca, one of Capone’s cronies! I wrote the name down. I underlined it three times.

“Excuse me, Mrs. Cayce,” I said, softly. Worried I might spoil things by interrupting.

But she only looked back with a gentle, Madonna-like smile. “Yes, Mr. Heller?”

“Would it be possible for me to ask Mr. Cayce a few questions?”

Without hesitation, she said, “Certainly,” and rose from the chair and gestured me toward it.

Hating myself for getting sucked into this swami’s act, I went to the chair and sat.

“Can you tell me about the kidnapping itself?” I asked. “How did it happen?”

“The baby was removed from the room, about eight-thirty P.M., carried by a man,” he said. “Another man was waiting below.”

I didn’t want to prompt him unduly, so I just said, “Below?”

Cayce nodded; his eyes remained closed. He looked peacefully asleep. “The child was lowered to the ground and taken to a car. Now we find there are changes in the manner of transportation….”

That did make sense, of course; changing cars made sense, But you didn’t have to be psychic to figure that one out.

“Another car is used,” he said. “They moved northward, toward Jersey City, through a tunnel and across New York City into Connecticut, into the region of Cordova.”

I was writing this stuff down; God knew why, but I was.

“On the east side of New Haven,” he said, “following a route along Adams Street, they took the child to a two-story shingled house, numbered Seventy-Three. Two tenths of a mile from the end of Adams Street is a brown house, formerly painted green, the third house from the corner. There is red dirt on the pavement. The child is in a house on Scharten Street.”

I felt like a fool, writing this prattle down, but part of me was caught up in it. Cayce, like any good faker, had a certain presence.

“Is the baby still at this address?”

“Yes.”

Breckinridge was standing, next to me, now. He said to Cayce, “Was Red Johnson involved?”

“Involved, as seen.”

“Was the nurse, Betty Gow, involved?”

“Not directly.”

“Who else?”

“A woman named Belliance.”

That name rang no bells with me.

I took over for Breckinridge. “Who guards the baby now?”

“The woman and two men who are now at home.”

“Where?”

“Follow my instructions,” he said testily, “and you will be led to the child.”

“I know New Haven well,” Breckinridge said. “I’ve never heard of Cordova. Can you tell us through what channels Scharten Street might be located?”

“By going to the street! If the name’s on it, that’s a right good mark!”

Breckinridge looked at me with wide eyes and I shrugged.

“Follow my instructions and you will find the child. We are through.”

“Where…” Breckinridge began, but Mrs. Cayce gently moved between him and Cayce. She was shaking her head, no, raising a palm to us both, in a stop motion.

She bent forward over her husband and murmured something, to bring him out of it.

A few moments later, Cayce drew a long, deep breath and his eyes popped open. He sat up. He yawned, stretching his arms.

“Did you get everything down?” he asked his secretary.

Miss Davis bobbled her pretty blonde head.

He stood. With utter certainty, he said to Breckinridge, “Follow what you heard-whatever it was I said-and you’ll get that child back.”

Dazed, Breckinridge said, “Well…thank you. We’ll follow up on everything we heard here, today.”

Cayce beamed, patted Breckinridge on the shoulder. “Splendid. My secretary will send you a carbon of the transcription. Do let me know how it comes out. We like to follow up on these things.”

He might have been talking about some kid’s cough he prescribed a poultice for.

“What do we owe you, Mr. Cayce?” Breckinridge said.

Here it comes, I thought. Here it finally comes.

“We normally charge twenty dollars for a reading,” he said. “I wish it weren’t necessary to charge at all.”

Twenty bucks? That was chicken feed for a racket like this.

“But in this case,” Cayce said somberly, “I will make an exception.”

Ah! Now comes the sting-he knows he’s dealing with dough-Lindbergh and Breckinridge and Anne Lindbergh’s wealthy family, the Morrows….

“Pay me nothing,” he said. “And please, as to the press…”

That was it, then-he wanted the publicity.

He waggled a finger, like a schoolteacher. “Not a word to them. I don’t want the notoriety. I don’t want to be involved in criminal cases again. Much too unpleasant.”

I felt like I’d been whacked by a psychic two-by-four. With a mystic nail in it.

Mrs. Cayce served us supper in her cozy kitchen, before we left; it was pot roast and potatoes and carrots, much like the meal at the Lindberghs-only the meat was tender and the side dishes delicious, in the best country manner.

“Some day you gentlemen will have to have life readings,” Cayce said, helping himself to a heaping portion of