Melting the Snow on Hester Street Read online

  She dressed automatically, with the usual elegance and care. She arranged her hair and chose her jewellery. She called down and ordered a car. She checked her bag for the chequebook, and then her watch for the time. She did all this with a sense of resolve she had not felt in many years, if indeed she had ever felt it. But it did not come as a relief to her. The decision she had made – the answer that came to her so clearly – was not setting her free to begin a new life, so much as allowing her to accept, at last, that her life was already over. She would take the car to the Gregory offices, settle her bill, and bring an end to the goose chase. And then she would return to LA and bring an end to her marriage.

  57

  Matthew Gregory couldn’t have timed his exit from the stock market with better precision if he’d wanted to assure his own ruin. His orders to sell – and to sell everything – hit the trading floor at the peak of the frenzy, and he had gone down owing his broker $5,000. Matthew Gregory was ruined, and so, too, was his Investigative Specializations Bureau. Eleanor didn’t know it yet, but it changed the rules of their engagement.

  Clara Davison, office secretary at the bureau since the day it opened, 22 May 1913, used once to consider herself a conservative type of women, but in yesterday’s crash she had hardly fared any better. All those months working so close to that ticker machine had worn her down eventually, and, unbeknownst to her conservative type of husband, she had been quietly playing the market for three years. Only six weeks ago, when the market was at its highest point in history, and it seemed prices could only move in one direction, she sat proudly on her secret nest-egg: swelled from $650 to almost $5,000 in just three years. Until that point she only ever bought stocks she could pay for in full. But then, it had just seemed so silly. Everyone around her was doing it. And everyone was getting so rich! She began to buy on margin, increasing her exposure more each day.

  Yesterday, she lost all her savings, and half the value of her house. That Friday morning, when she arrived to open up the bureau, make Matthew Gregory’s coffee, put fresh flowers in the foyer to welcome their famous client, she left the house she and her retired husband no longer owned, without quite finding a moment to tell him the bad news.

  Nevertheless, she made the coffee, arranged the flowers. Both tasks took longer than usual, because her hands were shaking and because she felt sick. It was half an hour, bustling around the place, before she turned her attention to Matthew Gregory’s desk.

  Nine thirty a.m. He was due in at any second. She cast an eye across the desk’s surface – set the coffee down, flicked some dust from the leather tabletop – and spotted the two envelopes at last. One was for her, the other for Eleanor Beecham.

  She lifted them both and immediately tore open her own.

  My dear Mrs Davison,

  I am very sorry to have to tell you that yesterday’s stock collapse, which you have no doubt read about, has taken a heavy toll on my affairs. To be blunt with you, there is nothing left. The well is dry, Mrs Davison. There is no other way to put it.

  I will come to the office in due course and we can discuss what we need to discuss with regard to the closing up of the business. (Please find enclosed a cheque for this month’s salary. I must advise you to cash it at your earliest convenience if it is to be of any value.) In the meantime, I am afraid I am quite unwell, and my wife, who has delivered this and the other letter, has insisted that I remain in bed.

  As you are aware, Mrs Beecham has an appointment with me at ten o’clock. She is generally punctual. Kindly deliver my letter to her when she comes. It is a letter explaining why I can no longer continue to help her in her inquiries. I have also enclosed an invoice. It is imperative – I must impress this upon you, and you must impress it on her – that she settles her bill before leaving the premises.

  I would ask that the sum be paid in cash and, if you can manage to get this out of her, I would be very much obliged.

  With my heartfelt thanks,

  M Gregory

  Mrs Davison had only finished reading the letter when Eleanor glided into the room, the usual cloud of lily of the valley and shimmering stardust.

  ‘Oh!’ Mrs Davison cried, quite alarmed, Eleanor’s unopened letter still in her hand. ‘Good morning, Mrs Beecham. You’re very early!’

  ‘I am sorry,’ Eleanor’s husky actress voice sounded calm – no different from yesterday. ‘I hope I am not disturbing you?’ she asked, removing her sunglasses, seating herself in the usual chair, in front of Gregory’s empty desk. ‘Has Mr Gregory not arrived yet?’

  ‘He-he has not … May I get you some coffee?’

  ‘No. Thank you. What time does Mr Gregory normally get here?’

  ‘Well … normally …’ For a moment, Mrs Davison forgot her own troubles. She could feel herself blush, ashamed of her boss. ‘Normally, he gets in about now. I mean – generally, he’s very prompt. It’s one of those things about him, you know? A characteristic …’ She fell silent.

  ‘Are you all right, Mrs Davison?’ Eleanor inquired politely. ‘You look pale this morning.’

  ‘Oh! Do I? I am sorry. Yes, I’m absolutely fine.’

  ‘My driver tells me there’s been Armageddon in Wall Street.’

  ‘Oh, yes …’

  ‘I hope you’re not affected?’

  ‘Goodness. It’s very kind of you …’

  ‘Or Mr Gregory? I think he has some interests, doesn’t he? I hope his stocks haven’t suffered?’ She laughed, a languid laugh that jarred rather with Mrs Davison. ‘You know – I hardly dare to call home myself. I imagine it’s …’ It was Eleanor’s turn to fall silent. Actually she didn’t care what it was – not even enough to finish the sentence. Instead she glanced back at Mrs Davison, who stood before her, clasping Mr Gregory’s two letters.

  She spotted her name. ‘Is that one for me?’ she asked, putting out a gloved hand.

  ‘Oh gosh. Why yes, I think it is,’ said the secretary. ‘I mean to say … why, yes. It is. It is from Mr Gregory. He has asked me to give it to you. He has written to me, too. And I don’t think he will be coming in to see you. Not today …’

  Eleanor didn’t reply. Slowly, she removed her gloves, leaned forward to take a letter knife from Gregory’s desk – silver plated, with two small revolvers crossed at the nozzles by way of a handle.

  ‘He’s not feeling terribly well …’

  58

  Dear Mrs Beecham,

  Please accept my apologies. I am laid low with headache and fever and have been ordered by my good doctor not to leave my bed under any circumstances this morning. It is my greatest regret, therefore, that I am unable to deliver this painful decision to you in person.

  I am sorry to tell you that, after much consideration, I cannot continue to work on your case. As Mrs Gregory eloquently put it when I discussed the case yesterday evening (leaving out all names, of course), we are ‘chasing shadows’. I fear Mrs Gregory has put her finger on it.

  According to public records, your mother, Isha’s grandmother and guardian, passed away in the winter of 1913, during an outbreak of tuberculosis in a building so dangerously overcrowded and with such minimal sanitation that it was later deemed unsafe for human habitation. The outbreak that killed your mother took the lives of many others, including several who were never formally identified. This, you do not deny. In all the years since that time, and despite energetic inquiries both by my father and myself, there has never been a single shred of evidence to suggest that your young daughter survived beyond that date. By your own admission young Isha was always an extremely sickly child.

  Taking this into account, in conjunction with all the evidence collected and collated by myself and my father, and having had the good fortune to have spent these last few days with you, I now feel able to state, with absolute confidence, that in my opinion your beloved daughter passed away, alongside her loving grandmother, in the winter of 1913 in that dangerously overcrowded building, at that same tragic time. There is no other possible
answer. My only hope is that one day you will accept this terrible truth, and find a way to continue in your life in the knowledge that your daughter is with God and at Peace, in a place where you, her Loving Mother, will one day surely join her. I grieve for you in your suffering, Mrs Beecham, I surely do. There is always a price to be paid for great fame and fortune, and you and your husband have certainly paid it.

  With respect to the work my father and I have conducted over the years, with an additional percentage for the discretion, so important in all detective agency work, but especially essential in such a case and with a person such as yourself, please find enclosed an invoice, to be settled with Mrs Davison immediately, before leaving today. I must also request that you settle the amount in cash.

  As you can appreciate, your most particular case, with all the secrecy required, past, present and future, has been an unusually troublesome one, and this has, understandably, been reflected in my final bill.

  Wishing you only the very best of luck in the future. Mrs Gregory and I shall continue to look out for all your movies.

  Matthew Gregory

  Eleanor read the letter from top to bottom with Mrs Davison standing, bird like, beside her, nervously awaiting the response. But Eleanor’s face was impassive. She laid the letter onto the top of Mr Gregory’s desk and turned to the invoice folded inside it. Without looking up at the secretary, she asked her evenly:

  ‘Do you know the contents of this already?’

  ‘I understand there is an invoice …’

  Eleanor arched one of her finely sculpted, studio-approved eyebrows. ‘My oh my, it is quite some invoice,’ she said.

  ‘He wrote me you might like to settle in cash …’

  ‘Yes. He wrote it to me too, though I’m not certain what it is I am paying for exactly. Are you? Since he’s not been exactly helpful.’

  ‘WelI I think for his time perhaps … But I know nothing about the case itself, of course,’ Mrs Davison added hurriedly.

  ‘Oh,’ Eleanor smiled at her. ‘But you must have a small idea. I have been looking for my daughter.’

  ‘Well yes. Indeed. Of course, I am aware … so to speak. I think – if I may say so – in Mr Gregory’s defence … Mr Gregory mentioned to me that perhaps you were searching for your daughter because … perhaps … it was so very difficult for you – or for any mother – to accept …’

  Eleanor turned her cool gaze upon Mrs Davison, daring her to finish the sentence. Clara Davison thought better of it.

  ‘There is no breakdown of the costs,’ Eleanor continued, after a short silence. ‘And I am not too clear how he reached this final figure. Are you?’

  Mrs Davison wasn’t sure whether to admit to the client that she didn’t know what the final figure was – let alone how her employer might have reached it. So she didn’t reply.

  ‘Added to which,’ Eleanor observed, ‘he has crossed out the original figure …’ She brought the paper closer. ‘Which was rather lower … five thousand dollars lower, if you please. And put this new one beside it. He has asked me for twenty thousand dollars! Wouldn’t you agree—’

  Miss Davison gasped.

  Eleanor nodded: ‘—that it’s rather steep?’

  ‘I think – may I see? It must be an error.’

  ‘Clearly an error,’ Eleanor said. Her mind was racing. He had underestimated her, of course. People often did. In his clumsy way, Matthew Gregory was attempting to blackmail her. Of course. He’d been wiped out in yesterday’s crash – and the poor dub was trying to recoup what he could, wherever he could. Almost … she felt sorry for him. What a fool he was! And what a fool she was – to have imagined for a moment that he might hold any answers for her, any comfort whatsoever.

  He knew nothing. Not really. But he knew enough to be dangerous. With a little intelligence and effort (unlikely but always possible) he could perhaps discover more, cause unimaginable damage. It was true, on the other hand, that she had taken up some of his time. She owed him for that, and she would pay him generously for it.

  She would also deal with the other matter.

  ‘Tell Mr Gregory, would you?’ she said, still without looking at the secretary, ‘that I will pay him in cash. But he is to meet me, and take it from me, face to face. I need to go to the bank, of course. I’m hardly likely to carry that sort of cash around with me. Tell him I will come to his house in an hour’s time.’

  ‘Oh! Well, he might prefer to come into the bureau—’

  ‘At his house. In an hour’s time.’ She stood up, put back her sunglasses. She looked down at Miss Davison. ‘You need to give me the address.’

  ‘Yes … Yes of course.’

  ‘Is he ruined, then?’ Eleanor asked, as an afterthought. ‘Is it all over for him?’

  Mrs Davison said: ‘I really don’t know. I think perhaps it is.’

  ‘Has he paid you?’ she asked.

  ‘He has written me a cheque for the month, but he sounded as if he wasn’t sure it would be honoured.’

  Eleanor laughed. ‘You’ve worked here for many years, I think?’

  ‘I have, Mrs Beecham. Yes, indeed. Since the bureau opened.’

  ‘Well. If you come with me to the bank I will give it to you in cash. Three months’ wages, I think. No. Six. And I will deduct it from his final figure.’

  Oh! That’s very kind of you, Mrs Beecham. Very kind.’

  Eleanor brushed it aside. ‘Thank Mr Gregory.’

  ‘Are you really going to pay him as much as he is asking? If I may say, it seems a tremendous figure.’

  Eleanor was already at the other end of the room, sweeping past the infernal ticker machine, still tick-ticking away. ‘Certainly not,’ she replied. She turned back to the secretary. ‘Are you coming or aren’t you?’

  59

  Matthew Gregory stood at his front parlour window in pyjamas and dressing gown, sweating less with the fever than with acute discomfort at his own conduct. He waited impatiently for her car to arrive. Clara Davison had called to tell him Eleanor Beecham was on her way, but would she really come, he wondered. And with so much cash? His secretary hadn’t wanted to talk. She’d delivered the message and ended the call before he had a chance to question her. Now, all he could do was wait.

  At length, a taxi drew up outside the house. In a flash he was out of his front door and trotting nervously down the neat garden path towards it. Under no circumstances did he want Eleanor to meet his wife and daughter. Not now. Nor ever. He wanted the business over and done with. He wanted the money and then for her to be gone, preferably never to be seen or thought of again.

  He was beside the car before she could climb out. He opened the door himself and stood in such a way that it was impossible for her to step down.

  ‘Mrs Beecham,’ he said, beads of sweat at his forehead. ‘How very kind of you to come …’

  He was nervous, she noticed. More nervous than she was. Eleanor stayed where she was, settled in the back seat of the car.

  ‘I received your letter.’

  ‘Yes. Indeed.’ He looked around him, unsure quite what to do next. He wanted to apologize.

  ‘Why don’t you climb in?’ she suggested.

  His shoulders – his face – softened in relief.

  ‘Well – if I may,’ he said.

  ‘I just this minute suggested it,’ she snapped. ‘Of course you may.’

  ‘Excuse my attire. As you know,’ he mumbled, climbing in, ‘I am feeling a little unwell.’

  What had possessed her, she wondered, as she watched him, fussily tucking his robe around him, to confide in such a man? What idiocy, what desperation, what loneliness? It didn’t matter anyway, not any more. She waited as he settled himself.

  ‘It’s hot today,’ he said. ‘Very, very hot. Or is it only me who feels it?’

  She didn’t reply.

  ‘Well. And first of all, Mrs Beecham, thank you. Thank you for coming out this way. I would invite you in. But the little one has her cousins around – I
think you would find it too noisy.’

  ‘I think you are quite right,’ she interrupted him. ‘I am “chasing shadows”, as you put it.’

  ‘It was Mrs Gregory—’

  ‘Strangely enough, I was coming to your office this morning having arrived at much the same conclusion myself.’ It amazed her that she could voice it so evenly, her morning conclusion that all hope was gone. ‘I have been chasing shadows,’ she said again.

  A heavy pause. Torn between financial desperation and (confronted now by her actual presence) simple, human sympathy for a grieving mother, Mr Gregory lifted a hand, small and hot, and placed it gently upon hers: cool to the touch, he noticed, fragile, bony, even through the gloves.

  She snatched it away. ‘I have brought you some cash.’

  ‘Oh!’

  ‘You sound surprised.’

  ‘No! That is to say. It is not just about the money. I wanted to say how sorry I was …’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  ‘I mean it,’ he said. And so he did, at the instant. ‘I am so very sorry.’

  ‘You asked for fifteen thousand dollars. And then added another five thousand. In the same letter.’

  ‘Yes, I … there were some incidentals. Expenses and so on, which I had failed to take into account.’

  ‘I have decided to pay you six thousand dollars. I think it’s more than generous.’

  He glanced at her – a slithery, sidelong look, hoping not to catch her eye. But it seemed that she was gazing at him quite coolly. Or he thought she was. It was hard to tell, behind the sunglasses. ‘I can’t really see your eyes,’ he complained.

  ‘Of which,’ she continued, ‘I have given one thousand dollars, in cash, to your secretary. It seems the least you could give to her, after all her years of service. I understand the agency is kaput.’