The Alienist

brow. “That’s fairly coarse twine,” he continued, pointing first at the bit of cord on the rooftop, and then at the boy’s wrist again. “Even during a brief struggle it should have left significant marks.”

Sara looked from the twine to Lucius. “Then—there was no struggle?” And in the way she said it there was real sadness, sadness that reverberated heavily in my chest—for the implication was obvious. Lucius went on to state it:

“It’s my suspicion that the boy allowed himself to be tied, and that even during strangulation, he made very little attempt to fight against the murderer. He may not have been fully aware of what was happening. You see, if there’d been an attack and actual resistance, we’d also find cuts or at least bruises on the forearms, made when the boy tried to fend the assault off. But again, there’s nothing. So…” Lucius glanced up at us. “I’d say the boy knew the killer. They may even have engaged in this kind of binding on other occasions. For…sexual purposes, in all likelihood.”

Theodore sucked air sharply. “Good lord…”

Watching Sara’s face again, I saw a glint in the corners of her eyes: welling tears that she blinked away quickly.

“That last part’s just a theory, of course,” Lucius added. “But I feel very confident in saying the boy knew him.”

Kreizler nodded slowly, his eyes narrowing and his voice going soft: “Knew him—and trusted him.”

Lucius finally stood and turned away from the body. “Yes,” he said, switching the worklamp off.

At that, Sara got to her feet in a sudden movement and rushed to the edge of the roof farthest from where we were standing. The rest of us glanced at each other questioningly, and then I went after her. Approaching slowly, I saw that she was looking out at Lady Liberty, and I confess to some surprise at not finding her heaving with sobs. Instead her body was quite still, even rigid. Without turning she said:

“Please don’t come any closer, John.” Her tone, far from hysterical, was icily even. “I’d rather not have any men around me. Just for a moment.”

I stood awkwardly still. “I’m—sorry, Sara. I only wanted to help. You’ve seen a lot tonight.”

She let out a bitter little chuckle. “Yes. But there’s nothing you can do to help.” She paused, but I didn’t leave. “And to think,” she continued at length, “that we actually thought it might have been a woman…”

“Thought?” I said. “So far as I know, we still haven’t ruled it out.”

“Perhaps the rest of you haven’t. I don’t suppose you could be expected to. You’re working at a disadvantage, in that area.”

I turned when I felt a presence at my side and found Kreizler carefully moving closer. He indicated silence to me as Sara spoke on:

“But I can tell you, John—that’s a man’s work, back there. Any woman who would have killed the boy wouldn’t have…” She groped for words. “All that stabbing, binding, and poking…I’ll never understand it. But there’s no mistaking it, once you’ve…had the experience.” She chuckled once grimly. “And it always seems to begin with trust…” There was another very awkward pause, during which Kreizler touched my arm and with a movement of his head told me to return to the other side of the roof. “Just leave me for a few minutes, John,” Sara finally finished. “I’ll be fine.”

Kreizler and I moved away quietly, and when we were out of Sara’s hearing Laszlo murmured, “She’s right, of course. I’ve never come across any feminine mania—puerperal or otherwise—that could compare to this. Though it probably would have taken me a ridiculously long time to realize it. We must find more ways to take advantage of Sara’s perspective, John.” He glanced around quickly. “But first we must get out of here.”

While Sara remained at the edge of the roof, the rest of us set to work gathering up the Isaacsons’ equipment and removing all traces of our presence, primarily the little splotches of aluminum and carbon powder that dotted the area. As we did so, Marcus initiated a conversation concerning the fact that half of the six murders we now felt confident assigning to our killer had occurred on rooftops: a significant fact, for rooftops in the New York of 1896 were secondary but nonetheless well-worn routes of urban travel, lofty counterparts to the sidewalks below that were full of their own distinctive types of traffic. Particularly in the tenement slums, a broad but definable range of people sometimes did a full day’s business without ever descending to the street—not only creditors seeking payment, but settlement and church workers, salesmen, visiting nurses, and others. Rents in the tenements were generally scaled in proportion to the amount of exertion required to reach a given flat, and thus the most unfortunate residents occupied the top floors of buildings. Those who had business with these poorest of the poor, rather than braving the steep and often dangerous staircases repeatedly, would simply move from one high floor to another by way of the rooftops. True, we still didn’t know just how our man was getting to those rooftops; but it was clear that once there he made his way around with great skill. The possibility that he had once held, or currently did hold, one of those roof-traveling jobs was therefore worth exploring.

“Whatever his occupation,” Theodore announced, coiling the rope we’d used to lower Marcus down the wall, “it would take a cool mind to plan this kind of violence so precisely and then carry it out so thoroughly, when he knows that the possibility of apprehension is never very far off.”

“Yes,” Kreizler answered. “It almost suggests a martial spirit, doesn’t it, Roosevelt?”

“What’s that?” Theodore turned to Kreizler with an almost injured look. “Martial? That was not my meaning, Doctor—not my meaning at all! I would be loath indeed to call this the work of a soldier.”

Laszlo smiled a bit, devilishly aware that Theodore (who was still years away from his exploits on San Juan Hill) viewed the military arts with the same boyish reverence he had since childhood. “Perhaps,” Kreizler needled further. “But a cool head for carefully planned violence? Isn’t that what we endeavor to instill in soldiers?” Theodore cleared his throat loudly and stomped away from Kreizler, whose smile only broadened. “Make a note of it, Detective Sergeant Isaacson,” Laszlo called out. “A military background of some kind is definitely indicated!”

Theodore spun around once more, eyes wide; but he only managed to bellow “By thunder, sir!” before Cyrus burst out of the staircase, as alarmed as I could remember ever having seen him.

“Doctor!” he shouted. “I think we’d better get moving!” Cyrus raised one of his big arms to point north, and all our eyes followed the indication.

At the edges of Battery Park, near the several points of entry, crowds were gathering: not the kind of well- dressed, politely behaved throngs that occupied the area during the day, but milling pockets of shabbily dressed men and women on whom the mark of poverty was plain even from a distance. Some carried torches and several were accompanied by children, who seemed to be thoroughly enjoying this unusual early morning foray. As yet there were no overt signs of threat, but it had all the makings of a mob.

CHAPTER 15

Sara came and stood by me. “John—who are they?”

“Offhand,” I answered, feeling a different and a more vital sense of concern than I had at any point during that night, “I’d say that the morning edition of the Post has reached the streets.”

“What do you suppose they want?” Lucius asked, his head sweating more than ever despite the cold.

“They want an explanation, I expect,” Kreizler answered. “But how did they know to come here?”

“There was a cop from the Twenty-seventh Precinct,” Cyrus said, still very anxious, for it had been a mob much like the one we now faced that had tortured and killed his parents. “He was down there with two other men, explaining something to them. Then those two fellas went into the crowd and started talking it up pretty good, about how it’s only poor foreign kids that’re getting killed. Seems most of those people out there come from over on the East Side.”

“The officer was, no doubt, Roundsman Barclay,” Theodore said, his face full of that particular anger that was inspired by treacherous subordinates. “He’s the man who was here earlier.”