| |
––––––––
October 5th, 1921 The Hotel Ngaio
MATT leaned forward in an armchair pulled close to the coffee table in his sitting room, on which sat the crystal radio receiver he’d built the week before. He’d constructed a similar set back as a boy in Illinois, to earn his electronics badge. As much fun as that had been, this was far more exciting, following the fad of the day for building one’s own radio, and all so he could listen to the very first broadcast of a World Series game. He wondered how many other New Yorkers were listening at that moment.
It recalled to his mind the stories he had heard from his parents, how when they’d been young their entire neighborhood would gather around the first television set someone had bought, crammed into a single living room to watch a game together. And in a similar way, Matt was joining untold numbers of his neighbors in listening to history through a set of headphones. He couldn’t remember if the Yankees or the Giants would win—though it would probably be the Yankees, all things considered—but it hardly mattered. It was thrilling regardless, presuming he could actually get to hear it.
Twisting the dial, trying to find the whispers he could hear through the hiss of static, he pressed the pad against his left ear and closed his eyes to focus. He was growing more and more frustrated as he attempted to tune into the right frequency. Then suddenly he heard loud and clear the sound of a swinging bat cracking a ball high into the air, followed by the noise of the crowd cheering in the background, as an excited announcer described the play. But as the slugger rounded second base, Matt’s mind wandered to thoughts of Page.
Whatever she’d gone out to do this evening, she hadn’t told him what that was and clearly didn’t feel the need to have him along. Which wasn’t unusual, as sometimes she simply wanted to observe people and hardly required Matt’s presence for that. That didn’t stop him from worrying about her though, or missing her. But tonight he’d specifically wanted to be here to listen to the game. And her having other business had meant he hadn’t needed to try to convince her that sitting and listening to a ballgame on the radio could be considered a ‘date night’. Somehow he doubted she’d have gone along with that.
Not that he didn’t enjoy taking Page out on the town, especially when they went dancing, but most of the time she preferred more formal functions. In that sense he’d gotten lucky with the Jazz Age’s fad for relatively casual entertainments. Because while he liked looking good, Matt didn’t particularly love dressing up, or the more constrained atmosphere of affairs requiring more formal attire. Still, he loved spending time with Page, whatever the situation or however frustrated he got. What he didn’t care for was not knowing where she was and worrying over what kind of trouble she might be getting into.
He took off his headphones and set them down on the coffee table in disgust, unable to concentrate on the game. Maybe a bit of a break would help, so he picked up the phone and asked the hotel operator to put him through to the kitchen, and when he got one of the waiters on the line, asked that a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and a glass of milk be sent up to his suite. But after a brief pause, he was told that the chef flatly refused—and recommended that anyone who wanted such plebian fare was welcome to take themselves and their tastebuds to one of the commercial establishments. Matt kept from pointing out that the Ngaio was a commercial concern. Rather than argue about it, he decided to follow the chef’s rather rude advice.
Perhaps Matt’s palate was middle-class, but in his mind peanut butter was brilliant, the best thing since sliced bread. Except sliced bread hadn’t been invented yet. The ‘convenience food’ phenomenon had only just begun though, so it shouldn’t be long in coming. Soon almost everything would be mass-produced and prepackaged—wrapped, canned, or frozen and available at the corner grocery.
By the twenty-first century, that had been taken to another level entirely. Which made him curious about the future Page came from—even though she had demonstrated no interest at all in cooking, she had been amazed how often people ate out in Matt’s time. Though she had adapted quite quickly.
As he shrugged into his jacket and left his suite to skip down the stairs, he smiled at all the little details she let slip. Just last week they’d gone to see a silent film, then afterward she’d made a comment, one that revealed they didn’t have movies in her future. But although she never seemed put out when she made a mistake like that, she always refused to answer any and all direct questions about where or when she came from or what it was like. Eventually he’d piece it together though. Probably long before he understood Page herself.
Reaching the lobby, he saw Michael the manager in conversation with the night clerk and paused. He was tempted to have a word with the man about the Ngaio’s chef concerning the question of peanut butter. Or maybe it was sandwiches the chef objected to. But Michael was busy—and a good manager Matt didn’t want to harass—and the unnamed chef might be a snob, but he was also skilled. Best to let it drop.
So Matt sketched a salute at the manager, then breezed out the door and down the street to the corner drugstore where he grabbed an adequate sandwich for a reasonable price. With that in hand and back out on the sidewalk, he stopped. He could go back to the Ngaio and get a glass of milk and go up to his room to eat, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to enjoy the game. Not while concern for Page still occupied his mind.
Usually she said something to him about what she’d be doing or where she’d be going when heading out on her own—in the course of planning their schedule so he could know when she did need him, as well as what she’d want him to wear. And when he would have time on his own. Even then he worried about her. But she hadn’t mentioned anything about her plans for tonight, and his ignorance troubled him. Because it was possible Riggleston could choose to target her instead of Matt.
That was the reason, Matt realized, that he felt more anxious about her than usual. Lifting up the edge of the shirt cuff hiding his anachronistic digital watch—actually a sophisticated, but not terribly reliable, time-travel device ‘disguised’ as a watch—he flipped to the locator screen and confirmed that Page wasn’t in the hotel, but somewhere due north. Unfortunately, the app didn’t indicate how far away she might be, but surely she’d still be in Midtown.
His feet were taking him north before he knew what he was doing, in the direction of where Rockefeller Center would one day be, though if the shops in that area were still open this late, that’s where he would expect to find her. Whatever she was doing, she wouldn’t want him barging in, but if he could at least find her, see for himself that she wasn’t in any trouble...
She need never know that he tracked her down. It was for his own peace of mind, so it was his business, really, not hers, and she said he was too overprotective as it was. So unless he discovered her in some sort of difficulty—in which case it would then become both their business and his job specifically to extricate her—he’d only be easing his own apprehension. She’d never spelled out precisely what being her helper entailed, but he knew it meant keeping her safe. And to do that, he had to know if and when she needed him.
Being her assistant also included a lot of dancing, dining out, and other assorted ‘research’ in addition to the danger. It was never boring. Still.
Chances were Page was perfectly alright and he was wasting his time, but he wouldn’t be able to relax until he was sure. By then it would likely be too late to listen to the end of Game One, but he had already ‘heard history’ and there would always be another game on. He considered catching a cab—this was one of the few eras when that was fairly easy to do—but he preferred to use his own two legs whenever possible. And it was simpler to walk, when he wasn’t certain of his destination.
He ate his sandwich as he walked, enjoying the mild and dry autumn air and even the bustle of the crowds. Every now and then he checked his watch, but the flashing red bar on the edge of its face kept leading him further north until he was nearing Columbus Circle. With peanut butter, jelly, and bread where it belonged, he became more vigilant. Belatedly, he realized, as the odds were higher that Riggleston would still be targeting Matt if the man desired revenge. And if he was again hiring someone else to do his dirty work, Matt wouldn’t know them to see it coming.
With a heightened awareness of the individual people around him, he became more surreptitious in checking the locator screen. He could not afford to start attracting the wrong kind of attention. And still he had to keep his antennae tuned to potential peril.
So he moved more slowly. The flashing red bar on his watch changed direction, and he followed it. Soon it disappeared and became a blip. Raising his head he realized he was approaching the Circle Hotel and that Page had to be inside. Probably having a great time studying the upper crust of society. It wasn’t too late for there to be swarms in the street, and the darkness was dispelled by the bright lights blazing throughout this section of the city. The atmosphere was gay, but he wasn’t feeling it himself. He remained uneasy.
He also had peanut butter sticking to the inside of his mouth, and he needed to do something about that. It wouldn’t be easy to find a glass of milk, but he saw a newsstand on the corner and went there to get a paper and a cheap cup of black coffee. Standing against the brick wall of a closed clothing store across from the Circle, he swigged the swill. It was bad but strong, and it served to clean the remnants of his meal out of his mouth. Scour it all away, and likely his insides too.
As he downed the coffee and pretended to read the folded paper in his hand, he asked himself what he thought he was doing. He had found out where Page had went, and there was no indication of trouble anywhere around. So he probably ought to just go back to his rooms and relax.
It wouldn’t do for him to still be standing there whenever Page left—she might see him and jump to the wrong conclusion, that he was checking on her. He had no right to track her down simply to satisfy his curiosity. Which wasn’t what he was doing, but it might be difficult to convince her of that if he got caught following her. Even though, he told himself again, he wasn’t. He also said, in his head, that she had simply forgotten to mention what she would be doing and where she’d be going.
He lifted the newspaper in his hand a bit higher, just in case, even as he realized how he must’ve looked ridiculous—all the cliché needed to be complete was for Matt to have a cigarette hanging from his lips as he staked out the joint. He would hardly be alone. Glancing around at some other hangers-about, he marveled at the way they seemed to have three or four hands, they way they juggled their cancer sticks and cups of coffee—or in some cases suspicious paper bags—with a newspaper or magazine and even managed to check their pocket watches.
Sighing, he knew he was wasting his time. She would finish whatever research she was doing, then return to the Ngaio without the slightest difficulty, and all he’d have accomplished was to help hold up the building behind him. There were better things he could be doing. Of course, watching people was often instructive as well as entertaining. So he waited and enjoyed the panorama. And waited.
Finally he spied her gliding out of the hotel lobby through the wide glass doors—opened for her by the uniformed man standing outside, who bowed as she left—and saw several eyes turn in appreciation. It took him a moment to realize she wasn’t alone.
The man who followed her out was dapper in a three-piece suit, if a bit on the short side, wearing a thin mustache and silly spectacles. He stood there chatting with Page while the doorman hailed a cab. And Matt had to tell himself not to be jealous.
He was way too far away to hear their voices. It would just be research for her anyway. He ought to be more concerned she shouldn’t see him there, so he never had to end up explaining his behavior. So he lifted the paper high enough to avoid seeing her and watched other people instead.
Now that he knew she was alright, he need only wait for her to hop in a taxi and head for home and he could walk back himself. Perhaps find a proper cup of coffee along the way.
Then looking off to the side, he noticed a twin—somebody else holding a folded-up paper and a cup of joe, who studiously ignored Page and her friend while watching them on the sly. That would not be for anything good. A nondescript sort of fellow, he had a covert interest in either her or the man at her side. If it was Page he was watching, which seemed probable, chances were it was someone who’d been hired by Riggleston for something, and Matt would have to deal with him. One way or another.
A cab slid to the curb and the doorman ushered Page into the backseat as a second taxi came in behind it. Her new acquaintance claimed that cab as the mysterious watcher flagged down another, then the taxi with Page pulled out into the maelstrom of Midtown traffic, quickly followed by the other two. And Matt would have a hard time trying to keep his eye on all three. So who to tail?
Loping down the sidewalk after them, he chose to focus on the cab carrying that mysterious watcher. Whoever that man was, he couldn’t follow both Page and the other man in their separate taxis. He would have to choose too, and that decision would at least tell Matt which of them the watcher was interested in the most.
Page would probably be headed back to the hotel, so she should be safe enough regardless. So he could focus on finding out about this fellow following her or the man she’d been talking to, and hopefully discover if it was Riggleston behind it all, or if she had attracted unfortunate attention from some other quarter. Matt had to know if he was going to keep her safe.
Thankfully the traffic was congested, and Matt and his long legs were able to keep up with the last of those three taxis, and even concentrating on it he could still see Page’s taxi leading them south down Broadway. It wasn’t long before it was turning east on Forty-fourth, presumably to carry her on a bit to the Ngaio. But the cab containing the man she had been talking to in front of the Circle—if Matt hadn’t mixed it up with the dozens of other taxis—kept on heading south. As did the one carrying the mysterious watcher. Who wasn’t following Page.
It was a relief to know it hadn’t anything apparently to do with Riggleston, that she had only been flirting with trouble of some sort through associating with the wrong person. Now he just had to find out who both of those men were and what the trouble was. Then maybe he would know if it posed any potential problem for Page.
Having committed to continuing the tail, Matt soon regretted the rash decision as he was forced to power-walk dozens of blocks down Broadway. And then when the two taxis finally turned, they headed east. Before long his legs were aching, his feet were sore, and all of him was on the Lower East Side and approaching the docks. Not at all a good area, and not well lit.
Matt wondered what a posh guy who socialized at the Circle would be doing at this time of night in a neighborhood like this. Probably nothing good. He also wondered how late it would be when he finally got back to his bed at the Ngaio, and whether Page would notice he wasn’t around. Poetic if she ended up being the one sitting around and worrying about him for once.
Then the first taxi was pulling up to the curb in front of a darkened warehouse. It let out the guy in the three-piece suit and sped away, while that man himself knocked on the high, wide door which was opened from the inside and slipped in speedily. As Matt would’ve done in the same situation. The cab with the watcher had slowed down and pulled over to the curb on the opposite side of the street as that had happened. But it parked there, and no one got out.
Matt walked on a ways past that taxi, but when he reached the shadows where he couldn’t be seen, stopped and sat down on the sidewalk, to wait and get a bit of a rest at the same time. He needed it.
Thirty minutes later he was busy regretting his reckless impetuosity more than ever before and deliberating the idea of giving up and returning to his rooms when he saw a beat cop come strolling down the sidewalk straight toward the parked taxi. Matt watched the uniform march up to the lowered window on the driver’s side to question the cabbie. He couldn’t hear what was said, but even though it was dark he could see well enough to tell what was happening, to see the silhouette sitting in the back lean forward and flash a leather folder in the cop’s face. He wished he could’ve seen the policeman’s expression, but his body language said enough. Surprise, respect, and then resentment.
The mysterious watcher who had such an interest in the fellow Page had been talking to had to be law enforcement of some sort. Plainclothes. While there might be any number of reasons the man had been tailing the three-piece suit, Matt didn’t have a notion what those might be, and he wasn’t likely to find out the facts hanging around here. Besides, he was tired.
He’d found out enough for one night. He started down the street quietly before the beat cop came along and asked him some awkward questions. As he made a block and started west and the long walk home—he kept an eye out for an available taxi, but probably in vain—he wondered who Page’s new acquaintance was and why the police were interested in him. More importantly, he hoped they hadn’t become interested in Page.
Most urgently, he tried to decide how he could broach the subject with her without looking bad.