Chapter Sixteen

Darla may have worn seersucker and cotton, but her manner was as imperious as a Russian czarina swathed in ermine. No sooner had Hank arrived with a barely conscious Evelyn than he’d been scolded, thanked, and hustled out the door. It slammed shut behind him, and Hank stood on the porch trying to collect himself. He’d been chained to Evelyn all day, and now he’d been cut loose like an anchor tangled in seaweed.

The horrifying shock of seeing the boy’s body, his face completely burned away, had nearly made Hank pass out. The fire had been thorough in erasing the child’s identity. He’d like to scrub the memory from his mind, but no bleach in the world would be potent enough.

Amato was a man among men. Not only did he manage to combine compassion with forthrightness, but he’d also tended Evelyn like she was his own daughter. He sent the nurse away and performed her duties himself. When Evelyn had come to, she’d said she didn’t know if the body might be Jamie’s. Amato promised to track Jamie down himself when he was no longer needed at the armory.

Didn’t Evelyn trust Hank? Confusion and exhaustion walk hand in hand, so he chose not to be insulted by her uncertainty.

It would take a detective to figure out what had happened. Hank had carried Jamie from the tent squalling and alive, and he’d handed him off to Clyde—one of the most reliable men Hank had ever met. Then what? Jamie should have been at the school or the hospital, and there was no explanation for why he wasn’t.

It took the entire thirty-minute walk back to the yard, where the train was on a side rail, for Hank to clear his mind. In a strange way, it no longer felt like home. Home was a cozy bungalow on Capen Street, where a sweet treasure of a woman was tucked in and asleep by now, he hoped. Common knowledge said tragedy formed artificially strong bonds between people, but nothing about his relationship with Evelyn felt fake.

He’d made a promise, so he swung by the doctor’s car for treatment of his burns. They were only first-degree, except for where the blob of paraffin had burned him. The doctor punctured the blister with a sterilized needle, and in an ironic twist which Hank didn’t miss, he slathered on a layer of petroleum jelly. But the stitches to close the latest wound Spartacus inflicted hurt like the dickens. The doctor said very few circus employees were injured and none had been killed. A miracle.

A cursory search for Clyde was unfruitful. He wasn’t in his berth. Circus people milled in the yard, huddling around burn barrels and conversing in small groups. Some still wore their ruined costumes. Clyde was likely among them somewhere, but exhaustion made Hank seek his own bed. Even so, sleep would be elusive tonight.

Russell’s snoring reached Hank’s ears even before he tugged the door open. Not surprising. Psychopaths couldn’t feel compassion. Had the crazy boy set the fire?

Hank snapped on the light.

Russell stirred, sat up, and rubbed his eyes. “Hey! I was asleep.”

“No kidding.”

“Why did you wake me up?” Russell stretched his arms, his bare chest glistening with perspiration. Not a smudge of soot anywhere.

“We need to talk. I want answers, and I want them now.” Hank yanked Russell’s feet and swung them to the floor. He crouched down until he was nose to nose with the boy. “Did you set the fire?”

Russell grabbed his pillow and clutched it to his chest. “Are you crazy? Why would I do that?”

“Because you’re as nutty as a pecan pie. You just don’t know it.”

More sweat beaded on Russell’s upper lip. He wiped his forearm across it. “I don’t answer to you.”

Hank picked up Russell’s shirt and tossed it to him. “Then get dressed. We’ll go see Eddie. You can tell him why you were spotted in the midway right before the fire.”

“I had to go to the bathroom.”

“A likely excuse. The fire started near the men’s bathroom. Did you and your Zippo have anything to do with that?”

“No! I used the bathroom, and when I came out, I saw the seat men trying to put out the fire. The buckets of water did nothing, and there were no extinguishers.” Russell’s eyes glittered. “They didn’t have a chance.”

“Why do you seem so happy about it?”

“You have to admit fire is a beautiful thing. So many colors. So much power.” Russell’s glazed expression and his even breathing made him look like the victim of Harry the Hypnotist. He belonged in an asylum.

Hank snapped his fingers, and Russell came back to himself. “Where were you after the fire? Why couldn’t anyone find you?”

“Clyde handed me a little kid and told me to take him to the hospital. The police was runnin’ around like chickens with their heads cut off. He told me the boy was important, and to get him out of there.” Russell thrust out his chest. “So I did.”

Jamie had been entrusted to a madman? What on earth had Clyde been thinking? Hank’s blood boiled like water in a whistling teakettle. “Where did you take him?”

“I got in a cab.” Russell grinned.

“Tell me what you did with the boy before I beat it out of you.” Hank formed a fist so Russell would know he wasn’t funning.

“Okay, okay. Calm down. Sheesh. You’d think the boy was your son or something.”

The statement pierced Hank’s soul like a javelin. Oh, how he wished he had a life in which he could enjoy a sweet wife and children. “Out with it. Where did you take him?”

“I told the cabbie to take us to the hospital. He did.”

“Municipal Hospital?”

“How should I know? I don’t live here. It was a big building with lots of people running around.” Russell laid back down in his bed and turned his back to Hank. “Now leave me alone. I was sleeping good.”

Hank’s barely-there control fractured. He grabbed Russell’s arm and pulled until the boy hit the floor. Hard. When he jumped to his feet, flailing and kicking, Hank grabbed a handful of Russell’s hair and held him at arm’s length. The boy had a fist the size of a small melon, but he was no match for Hank’s rage.

Soon enough, Russell tired. “Let go of me.”

“Are you ready to finish our conversation?”

“Yes. But I still don’t know why one kid is so important to you.” Russell sat back on his bed and turned impassive eyes on Hank. “Lots of kids died today.”

If Hank had allowed himself to speak, the words would have been ones that always provoked his mother to get the soap.

Russell sighed. “I took the kid to the hospital and gave him to a priest.”

“What was his name?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t ask. He was a priest, just standing there in a long black robe.”

Hank sat on his own bed and barely managed to remain upright as exhaustion ran over him like a freight train. “Let me get this straight. You took him to the hospital and gave him to a priest, but you don’t know his name.”

“Right.”

“But he was alive, right?”

“Yep. I couldn’t get rid of him quick enough. The kid cried the whole time, screaming for his mama.”

How many gut punches could Hank endure in one day? If he didn’t get some sleep—and soon—he’d hallucinate again. If Jamie had been at the hospital, where was he now? Without another word, Hank fell into his berth while still wearing Bill’s clothing and shoes.

“Hey. What about the light?” Russell always whined like a baby.

“Get it yourself.”

When the light was out, so was Hank.

Russell’s full-blown scream interrupted Hank’s fitful sleep. The dim light through the window shone on Russell as he thrashed and wrestled his pillow. Hank rose and shook him until the boy’s teeth rattled.

Russell grunted and awakened with a jerk. A moon ray lit his face in stark light and shadows like one of the plaster demons in the midway’s haunted house. In a creepy, even tone he murmured, “She said it was my fault.” Russell rifled through his things, found his rumpled shirt, and put it on.

“Who?”

“The woman.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I had another dream. A woman came up out of the flames. She pointed at the fire, and then she stared at me and yelled, ‘You are the cause of that.’” Russell put on his pants, fastened his belt, and put his shoes on without socks. “I’m getting out of here.”

He flipped on the light, knelt on the floor, and rifled through his things, grabbing the picture he’d drawn of the Red Man and his horse. He also pocketed his lighter. With no further words, he bolted from the car.

Hank was hot on his heels. He sprinted until he caught Russell just as he passed one of the burn barrels containing flames that danced into the night air. No other circus folk were around at this hour. He tried to wrest the drawing—which might actually be evidence of a crime—from Russell’s hands, but he only got a small corner. The rest tore away, and Russell pitched it into the fire. It immediately incinerated.

In the instant it took Hank to decide it was unsalvageable, Russell had vanished into the darkness.

Who would believe Hank now? Without a scrap of evidence, all he had was his own word. Besides, if he talked to the police, they’d surely connect him to what had happened in Speigletown. Hank would be more likely to end up in jail than Russell.

A hard knock echoed across the lot. When he turned to his railcar, three beefy police officers stood outside. One pounded on the door again and shouted, “Police. Open up!”

Hank was so tired of running. He wanted more than anything to be a man worthy of Evelyn’s affection, to say nothing of the gaping wound his disappearance from home had surely inflicted on his parents. Should he fight or flee?

Neither. Hank walked to the car and asked, “Who are you looking for?”

The man who had knocked said, “Hank Webb. He’s wanted for questioning. Do you know where he is?”

“I’m Hank.”

The policeman shoved Hank toward the street. “Come with us, and no funny business or I’ll get out my cuffs.”

Hank gave him no reason to be rough, but he was anyway. One of the officers muttered words Hank couldn’t hear except for an epithet connected to the words, “Circus freaks.”

Whether or not police identified him as a man wanted for murder in Speigletown, New York, being a circus employee in Hartford, Connecticut, was a bad enough indictment for today.

The organ prelude was nearly finished, and Evelyn allowed herself to enjoy the music for its own sake, not the lyrics she’d memorized long ago. They offered little comfort while she still nourished anger at God.

She was a hypocrite, really. Sitting in God’s holy sanctuary with a heart of stone, without the tiniest urge to worship or pray. Words suitable for the Almighty’s ears wouldn’t be the ones she’d speak if given the chance. She would only spew accusations and questions He wouldn’t answer. Still, she’d go through the motions for the sake of appearances.

Her mouth and throat were parched. She’d love a draught of Helen’s lemonade, but even the last remnants were gone, washed down the sink when she’d lovingly cleansed the two glasses dirtied the last night she’d seen her sister-in-law. The lipstick on Helen’s glass had dried to a red smudge, and after several tries, Evelyn had given up scrubbing it off. It could remain there for eternity as far as she was concerned. She patted the tumbler dry, opened the cupboard, and put it in the back corner, never to be used again.

Bill and Helen’s funeral would start in a few minutes. Friends, church members, and strangers packed the pews of the South Congregational Church. After the Sunday morning service, everyone had taken a break for lunch and returned to the church for the series of funerals that would take place that day, Bill and Helen’s coming first. More than a thousand people were in attendance.

Except one. She’d not seen Hank since he dropped her off at home the night of the fire. Perhaps she’d imagined the affection she sensed in his every word and gesture that day. Goodness knows he had no more reason to come to her aid. He had a job and a life apart from Evelyn’s, and besides, he’d be moving on with the circus when their train pulled out.

Still, Evelyn couldn’t help but crane her neck once in a while. She was met by sympathetic expressions from congregants who had no idea she searched for Hank. She’d much rather have sat in one of the side alcoves where she wouldn’t receive so much attention. Darla would have come, but with Lily so out of sorts, Evelyn had decided not to bring her niece to the funeral. Darla was the only one she trusted to babysit.

And Jamie? Evelyn’s nephew seemed to have vanished into thin air. The morning after the fire, Sergeant Amato had taken her to the only other place Jamie might be—Hartford Hospital across town, where a very small percentage of victims had been treated. It had been a long shot, so it hadn’t taken long to learn Jamie was not among them. Their search hadn’t turned up any leads.

Hank had promised to help in the search, but so far, he’d not reported to her in the two days it had taken to organize the funeral. The whole city was in crisis. Of what importance was the fate of one little boy when hundreds had been killed or injured?

The organ finished with a final crescendo, the last chord of “It Is Well with My Soul,” and the sound echoed from the white plaster ceiling and walls long after the musician lifted his hands off the keys with a flourish.

Reverend Archibald mounted the podium and stood behind the pulpit. He raised his arms, and the congregation stood. Evelyn faced forward although everyone else turned to watch the procession. The Wurlitzer organ blasted a hymn Evelyn loved—“Face to Face”—and the words vaulted over the barrier she had formed against spiritual thoughts.

Face to face I shall behold Him,

Far beyond the starry sky;

Face to face in all His glory,

I shall see Him by and by.

Only days ago, that “by and by” had seemed a far-off dream. But death was a capricious enemy, sometimes striking without notice and sweeping people into eternity. Today, Bill and Helen looked upon the face of Jesus, and a small part of Evelyn wished she could be with them.

Bill and Helen’s oversized walnut casket had been donated through a charity hastily formed by community leaders. It was adorned with a beautiful spray of red and white roses, also donated. Evelyn was grateful, since she didn’t have two pennies to rub together. When the procession passed Evelyn’s pew, a light scent of smoke overpowered the fragrance of the flowers. A powerful wave of heartache swept over her, and she tumbled beneath it. Her knees gave out, and she made a spectacle of herself by collapsing on the pew. She had never felt more alone.

The funeral proceeded as it should. Later, Evelyn marveled that she couldn’t remember a word Reverend Archibald had said.