Chapter Thirty-three
“Ryan, kick the door in,” Rufus Proudfoot yelled.
Red raised his booted foot, kicked hard, and the door that separated the rooms slammed open wide in a shower of wood splinters, and the four men burst into Hannah’s room.
Red was the first through, and he took in the situation at a glance.
Hannah Huckabee had her back to the wall to his right, a look of horror on her face. She held her Colt in her hand, smoke trailing from the muzzle.
A man lay writhing, twisting, convulsing on the floor, screaming in pain like a wild animal. His feet were bare, and beside him, its blade honed to a razor edge, lay a wicked-looking hand axe.
Hannah ignored Latimer and ran to Red, and he held her close, feeling her body tremble through the thin silk of her nightgown.
As voices were raised in the hallways, Hannah said, her voice rising, “He came into the room and tried to drag me out of bed. I had my gun hidden under the pillow and managed to shoot him. He was growling like a mad dog, snarling at me . . .”
Red made comforting noises, his eyes on the thing that twined and untwined like a wounded serpent on the floor, its screams reverberating through the witching hour quiet of the hotel.
“Son of a bitch is gut-shot,” Buttons Muldoon said. He made a face and pressed the palms of his hands over his ears against the shrill clamor of the man’s screeches and said, “That’s why he’s squealing like a stuck pig.”
Proudfoot stepped to the man and held him down with an elastic-sided boot on his chest and said, “Finally met your match, didn’t you, Ernie? Your murdering and raping days are over, my friend.”
The man cried out louder, his face twisted into a grotesque mask of torment. He opened his mouth and tried to talk, but he gagged on his own blood.
Proudfoot said, “Ah, yes, that’s what I wanted to see, Ernie, fear in your eyes. Was there fear in little Mary Ramey’s eyes as you raped her? Was there, Ernie?”
The man shrieked and tried to twist away from the Pinkerton boot that pinned him like an insect to the floor.
Proudfoot said, “Mary Ramey was just eleven years old, Ernie. A child. Just a child. You split her head open, Ernie. Yes, that’s what you did, didn’t you?”
The Pinkerton reached into his coat and drew his Colt. “I’m sending you to hell, Ernie. Enjoy the ride, huh?”
The killer’s shrieks abruptly cut off as Proudfoot’s bullet crashed between his eyes.
After the racketing roar of the Colt faded into a ringing silence, Proudfoot said, “His name was Ernie Miller, and he was the desk clerk of this hotel.”
* * *
At breakfast, in Mom’s Kitchen, Buttons asked, “Here, Pinkerton, did you know he was the Annihilator all along?”
“No. He was one of three men that fit the description I was given, and he was the last one I investigated,” Proudfoot said. “Ernie Miller was a loner. He had no known relatives or friends and spoke to nobody but the residents of the Regency Hotel. I dug deeper and discovered that he’d lived with a whore named Bessie White who he abused regularly. A doctor who treated Miller told me he blamed Bessie for the syphilis he’d contracted.”
The Mom’s Kitchen waitress refilled coffee cups, and the Pinkerton waited until she left the table to attend on the other early-morning breakfasters before he spoke again.
“Bessie White vanished, and Miller told his doctor that she’d gone to live with a maiden aunt in Philadelphia,” Proudfoot said. “The doctor suspected that Ernie killed her and dumped her body somewhere. Bessie White was probably the Servant Girl Annihilator’s first victim, but there’s no proof of that. Putting it all together, I was convinced I had my man.” The Pinkerton smiled. “And you know the rest.”
“Rufus, why did he go barefooted?” Hannah said.
“He’d creep up on his victims while they were asleep, and bare feet are silent.” Proudfoot smiled. “Ernie Miller had never attacked an armed female before, and Hannah, you took him by surprise when you cut loose with your revolver. The Pinkerton Agency hires female detectives, and I was always against arming them, but after last night, I’ve changed my mind.”
“A woman detective is an adventuress,” Hannah said. “She should be given a revolver and taught how to use it.”
Red Ryan said, “Proudfoot, how come Miller was able to get into Hannah’s room without being seen?”
“I thought Miller had left the hotel, but he’d waited outside in the dark, watching through the window,” the Pinkerton said. “When he saw me come down the stairs and head for the back door, he thought I was leaving. Ernie saw his chance and was determined to take it, but I think he stood outside for a while, anticipating the exquisite thrill of his next murder, and only then did he silently make his way upstairs. Little did he know that instead of a terrified victim he’d come up against an adventuress who carried a gun and could get her work in quickly.”
“I nearly wasn’t quick enough,” Hannah said. “When he grabbed me by the hair and raised the axe, I thought I was dead. And I would be dead now if I’d put my revolver on the bedside table and not under my pillow.”
Proudfoot leaned forward like a cloak-and-dagger conspirator and said in a low tone, “I do apologize, because I have yet another favor to ask, Miss Huckabee.”
“Then ask it if you must,” Hannah said. “So long as it doesn’t involve madmen, axes, and darkened rooms.”
“Well, it does in a way,” the Pinkerton said. “Did you happen to see those three gentlemen standing outside the hotel after the . . . ah . . . incident?”
Hannah shook her head. “No, I did not. For a while afterward, I was very distressed and didn’t notice much of anything.”
“Well, one of them was the mayor and with him was the chief of police and a representative of the town’s leading citizens,” Proudfoot said. “They request that you do not take the credit for killing the Annihilator. To put the minds of the women of Austin at rest, they wish the credit to go to the city police. They want them to know, or to think, that the constabulary can protect them.”
“Rufus, what kind of woman would I be if I went around boasting of a killing?” Hannah said. “Yes, let the police take the credit for ending the madman’s reign of terror, and welcome.”
“The mayor will be relieved to hear that,” Proudfoot said. “And so too will the chief of police and the women of Austin.”
“Glad I could be of help,” Hannah said.
The Pinkerton nodded. “Miss Huckabee, you’re the bravest woman I’ve ever met, a heroine in every sense of the word.”
Hannah looked at Red’s plate. “Are you going to eat that last sausage?” she said.