Lair of Dreams (The Diviners #2) (48 page)

Henry sat in the Proctor sisters’ overstuffed living room drinking bitter, smoky tea with Miss Addie and Miss Lillian while a herd of cats mewled and purred and rubbed up against his trouser cuffs. He made small talk for as long as was socially acceptable, listening to the Proctor sisters’ tales of various ailments, discord within the Bennington, and one story about an animal trainer mauled by a circus bear that was particularly gruesome and put Henry off the circus for the foreseeable future. At last, there was a blessed lull in the conversation, and Henry seized his opportunity.

“I was curious about something you mentioned the other day, Miss Adelaide,” Henry said. “As I was getting on the elevator, you said, ‘Beware, beware, Paradise Square’ and ‘Anthony Orange Cross.…’”

Miss Lillian’s cup stopped on the way to her lips. “Oh, Addie, honestly. Why would you bring up such unpleasantness?”

After the carnivorous bear story, Henry couldn’t imagine what Lillian Proctor would consider unpleasant, but his heart beat a bit quicker at her words. “Was this Anthony Orange Cross fellow known to you, Miss Lillian? Was he wicked?”

“Anthony Orange Cross isn’t a person,” Miss Lillian said. She sipped her tea. “They’re streets. Or they were, once upon a time. Those names are gone now to the dustbin of history.”

“Streets? You’re certain?” Henry said, deflating.

“Anthony is now Worth Street. Orange became Baxter. Cross had
been renamed Park Street well before we arrived, though most people in the Points still called it Cross.”

“We have lived here a very long time. We’ve seen many things come and go,” Miss Adelaide said.

“Near Chinatown, then?” Henry asked.

“Indeed. The intersection of Anthony, Orange, and Cross Streets once formed a little triangle called Paradise Square, down near Chinatown. And it
was
wicked. It was the foul heart of Five Points.”

“I’m sorry. I’m not familiar with Five Points,” Henry said.

“It was the most wretched slum on earth at one time! A place of thieves and cutthroats, bandits, and women of ill repute. Opium dens and people crowded into stinking, rat-infested rooms to sleep on top of one another. Oh, it was filth and degradation the likes of which civilized people cannot imagine. The mission could only do so much.” Miss Lillian tutted, shaking her head.

“The Methodist Mission and the House of Industry,” Miss Addie said and put her milky teacup on the floor for the cats. “It provided care and work for the less fortunate. Lil and I volunteered there for a brief spell, helping to rescue fallen women.”

Anthony Orange Cross was a forgotten intersection, not a killer. Paradise Square had been a slum. What did any of it have to do with the veiled woman? Henry wasn’t entirely sure that she was a ghost. Perhaps she was just a feature of their nightly walks, no more substantial than the fireworks or the children playing with stick and hoop? A message in a bottle delivered long after the writer is gone.

“Do you recall a murder that might’ve happened while you were with the mission?” Henry asked, a last-gasp attempt. “In Paradise Square, perhaps?”

“Young man, there were murders nightly,” Miss Lillian said. “You’d need to be more specific.”

“I don’t have a name, unfortunately. It’s a woman I’ve seen in my dreams,” he said, looking hopefully to Miss Adelaide, who stared into her cup. “She wears an old-fashioned dress and a veil.” Henry was
losing steam and hope. “She might’ve had a little music box that plays an old tune.
‘Beautiful dreamer, wake unto me…’”
he sang.

“
Starlight and dewdrops are waiting for thee.…
” Miss Addie sang in a whispery rasp. Her head snapped up. “The one who cries. I’ve heard her in my dreams, too.”

“Now, Addie, you mustn’t become agitated. You remember what the doctor said, don’t you?” Miss Lillian scolded. “Mr. DuBois, my sister has a weak heart. You mustn’t upset her.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Henry said. He didn’t want to exhaust Miss Adelaide, but he needed more information. “I only wondered if the woman in my dreams has a name?”

“The music box! That’s it. Yes. Yes, I remember. She came to us at the mission. Only for a few days. Don’t you recall, Lillian?”

“No. And I don’t wish to. Now, Addie—” Miss Lillian started, but Adelaide would not be stopped.

“I’d been trying to remember. It was there, but I couldn’t quite…” Miss Addie made a motion as if she were trying to grab something and bring it close. “She didn’t speak much English.”

“We had a lot of immigrants—they were easily preyed upon,” Miss Lillian said.

“She loved music so. Singing as if she were on the stage. Such a sweet voice,” Miss Addie said. “Yes, music. And that was how that terrible man reeled her back in.”

“What man?” Henry pressed, hoping Miss Lillian wouldn’t throw him out for it.

“That Irishman who ran the brothel,” Miss Lillian snapped. “I remember it now. He came for her one morning, talking sweetly. He gave her a little music box as a gift. He promised her a husband if she’d agree to go back.” Miss Lillian sighed. “That was that. She went away with him. I saw her only once after that. She was sick with opium and riddled with pox all along her pretty face. Syphilis,” Miss Lillian hissed. “It had rotted her nose right off, so she wore the veil to hide it. She still had the music box.”

“That’s it! It’s her,” Miss Addie said, agitated. “Oh, we are not safe.”

“Now, Addie, it was a long time ago,” Miss Lillian soothed. “That time is past.”

“The past is never past. You know that, Lillian,” Miss Addie whispered.

“We are safe. Everything put away in the box,” Miss Lillian said calmly, and Henry didn’t know what she meant.

“What happened to her?” he asked.

“I haven’t any idea.” Miss Lillian sighed and brought an orange tabby up onto her lap, scratching him lovingly behind the ears. “But I imagine it was a bad end.”

“She’s connected to him,” Miss Addie muttered. “They all are. I know it.”

“Now, Addie…”

“Connected to whom, ma’am?” Henry asked.

Addie looked at Henry with wide eyes. “The man in the hat. The King of Crows.”

“Addie, you’re entirely too riled. I’m afraid we must say good-bye to you, Mr. DuBois.”

Miss Lillian rose, signaling the end of the visit. Henry thanked the Proctor sisters for their time and the tea. Miss Addie reached for his china cup, frowning at the contents. “I don’t like the pattern of those leaves, Mr. DuBois. Some terrible day of truth is at hand. For you or someone you love. Careful,” she whispered. “Careful.”

Henry was still thinking about the Proctor sisters’ odd tale as he raced into rehearsal. It was the sort of story he’d usually share with Theta—“You won’t believe what the Jolly Vampire Sisters just told me!”—if they weren’t on the outs. To top it all off, he was twenty minutes late, thanks to an all-too-brief nap he’d fallen into, unable to fend off sleep. In the dream, Louis had waved to him from the
Elysian
as it churned up the Mississippi. Henry tried desperately to reach the boat, but the morning glories were so thick they blocked his path. And then the vines climbed up his body, wrapping around his neck until he woke, feeling choked.

At the loud bang of the theater doors, Wally’s head turned on his thick neck. “Well, well, well,” he said, glancing up the aisle. “If it isn’t Henry. DuBois. The Fourth. All hail.”

“S-sorry, Wally, I… I felt sick, and I guess I fell asleep.”

Wally sighed. “You been sick a lot lately.”

“Sorry. I’m jake now, though,” Henry said, slipping into his spot at the piano. He wiped a hand across his clammy forehead. Sweat dampened his armpits and the front of his shirt. Onstage, the rest of the cast and crew were crowded around Theta, congratulating her on the day’s splashy newspaper article heralding
ZIEGFELD GIRL RUSSIAN ROYALTY
.

“Now that we’re
all
here,” Wally said pointedly, “let’s take the Slumberland number from the top!”

Dancers scampered into position onstage, tugging at bloomers and securing tap shoes. Henry’s earlier fear faded, replaced by exuberance as he opened the score. Finally, one of his songs had made it into the show. He put fingers to the keys, playing along, his excitement vanishing quickly as the tap-dancing chorus girls sang along:

Henry’s breathing went tight, as if he’d been punched. The song was awful. His song. They’d ruined it. And they’d done it behind his back. Henry stopped playing.

“What’s the matter? You lose your place?” Wally asked. “You feeling sick again?”

Henry gestured to the piano score. “These aren’t my words. Where’s the song I wrote?”

“Well, uh, Herbie smoothed it over a bit,” Wally said.

“It wasn’t quite polished. I just gave it some zip and pep,” Herbie Allen said from the back row, as if he were Mr. Ziegfeld himself.

Onstage, everything had come to a standstill.

“What’s the big idea? Are we running the number or aren’t we?” one of the girls asked.

Wally wagged a finger. “Henry, play the song.”

“No,” Henry said. It was a word he used so infrequently that he was startled by the feel of it on his tongue. “I want to play
my
song.”

Whispers of gossip rippled down the chorus line.

“Everybody needs help now and then. Don’t take it personally, old boy,” Herbie said. Henry wasn’t a violent fellow, but right then, he had the urge to punch Herbert in his smug mouth.

“How else would I take it, Herbert, when you massacre my song?”

“Now, see here, old boy—”

“I am not your boy,” Henry growled.

The entire cast was silent as they looked from Henry to Wally to Herbert and back again. Suddenly, Mr. Ziegfeld’s voice boomed out from the very back row.

“Mr. DuBois, you are a rehearsal accompanist. I do not pay you for your musical interpretation.” The impresario marched down the aisle and stood in the middle like the commander of a mutinying ship.

“No, Mr. Ziegfeld, I’m not. I’m a songwriter. My songs are a damn sight better than this garbage.”

One of the midwestern chorus girls gasped.

“Forgive my language,” Henry added.

Mr. Ziegfeld gave Henry a flinty stare. “Your time will come, if you behave, Mr. DuBois. Now. Let’s get back to the number. We have a show to rehearse.”

The great Ziegfeld turned on his heel. The dancers shuffled quickly into formation. Just like that, Henry had been dismissed, no discussion. In his head, he heard his father’s voice:
You will go to law
school. You will uphold the family name. You will never see that boy again.
A dam gave way inside Henry.

“Mr. Ziegfeld!” Henry called, rising from the bench. “You keep saying we’ll add more of my songs, but it seems like I never can get that chance. It always goes to some other fella.”

“Henry…” Theta warned, but Henry was beyond warnings.

“I’m out of waiting, sir. If you don’t want my song, well, I guess you don’t need me. I’ll pack up and go.”

The great Ziegfeld didn’t even rise from his seat. “I wish you luck. But you’ll get no recommendation from me.”

In her tap shoes, Theta
clip-clopp
ed to the front of the stage and cupped a hand over her eyes to cut the glare of the lights. “He’s just tired, Flo. He doesn’t mean it.”

“Don’t talk for me, Theta. I mean every word.”

“You’re free to go, Mr. DuBois. Herbie, could you play for us, please? Wally—from the top.”

As the horrible number started up again, Henry marched down the aisle and pushed through the theater doors onto noisy Forty-second Street. The enormous marquee loomed over his head. Foot-high black letters promised
AN ALL-NEW REVUE
!

“All new!” Henry shouted to passersby, who looked at him as if he were crazy. “That’s right, folks! Step right up. We know you bore easily. Your shiny playthings lose their luster. Even now, you’re asking yourselves: What’s next? What am I missing? Will this make me important?”

It was all a machine that required constant feeding—Henry hated the machine, and he hated himself for wanting the sort of admiration it promised, as if he had no worth unless someone was there to applaud it.