Lair of Dreams

  “If you wait a minute, you can ride with me to the radio show. We could all go together, like real swells!”

  “Sorry, Evil. I hafta go back to rehearsal,” Theta said.

  “Mabesie?”

  For the past two months, Mabel had tried to ignore the changes in Evie. The way she now said eye-ther instead of eee-ther. The way she greeted people she hardly knew with a drawn-out daaah-ling. The way she always seemed to have time for parties and dates and her new glamorous pals, but not for Mabel. But this was too much. Weren’t she and Evie best friends? Shouldn’t a girl share the news of her engagement with her best friend first?

  Mabel’s conscience told her that she should go and cheer Evie on. But she was angry and deeply hurt, and she didn’t think she could tolerate being just one of the faceless crowd again.

  “Sorry. I’m not available,” Mabel said, turning on her heel. “I’ll get the elevator, Theta.”

  “I’ll be right there, kid. I gotta powder my nose first.” Theta waited until Mabel was down the hall, then cornered Evie. “Evil, are you really marrying Sam Lloyd?”

  “It’s in all the papers, isn’t it?” Evie said. It wasn’t precisely lying.

  Theta’s eyes searched Evie’s for an uncomfortable second. “You break the news to Jericho about your engagement?”

  “Why would I?” Evie said, looking away.

  “Just a hunch, but I don’t think he’s gonna take it well.”

  “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”

  Theta patted Evie’s face. “Keep telling yourself that.”

  When Jericho opened the day’s paper, he had to read the headline four times before it finally sank in: Evie was marrying Sam Lloyd. Sam “A Girl in Every Port” Lloyd. Sam, that grifter who couldn’t be counted on, who only looked out for himself. She’d chosen that jackass over him. When had it happened? Was that why Evie had avoided him, why she didn’t respond to his letters? Was that the reason for her brush-off at the Bennington last night? Sam Lloyd. Did girls really go for fellas like that? Did they truly find bad boys more attractive?

  Or did they just want to know that a fella was normal, a man, not a machine?

  A few months ago, Jericho had been shot. The pain had been a sharp pop of fire in his chest. Reading the article on Sam and Evie’s romance hurt even worse. He was glad that Will had already left with Sister Walker so that he could bear the sting of it in private.

  Off-key singing sounded in the hall, announcing Sam’s arrival, and Jericho cursed his luck.

  “Honey, ready my slippers and pipe—I’m home!” Sam shouted as he blew into the library and dropped himself onto the worn brown leather Chesterfield, ruddy-cheeked and smiling. “Freddy, you would not believe the day I’ve had so far. A real roller coaster. But there’s good news: Evie’s on board to host the Diviners exhibit opening.”

  “Congratulations. How’d you manage that?” Jericho said evenly.

  Sam stretched his arms across the back of the sofa and smirked. “Well, I did my best. And my best is pretty irresistible. So what do you think—should we hire a jazz band or an orchestra? See, I think jazz band. But the professor seems like the orchestra type to me—violins and French horns. Frilly-cuff music. Oh, and we could get somebody to cater.…”

  Jericho dropped the newspaper in Sam’s lap. “When were you going to tell me?”

  “Gee, Freddy,” Sam said quietly, pushing the newspaper aside. “I, uh, didn’t want to rub it in.”

  “Seems exactly like something you’d want to do. And don’t call me Freddy.” Jericho crossed to the fireplace, poking at the embers till they blazed.

  “Did you ever consider that maybe you got me figured all wrong?” Sam said.

  Jericho didn’t turn away from the fire. “I’m pretty sure I’ve got you figured exactly right. You’re a thief. You steal things. And people.”

  Usually Sam enjoyed the friendly competition over Evie’s affections, but just now, he felt like a real heel. He didn’t know exactly what had happened between Jericho and Evie. Maybe they’d kissed. Maybe more than that. But whatever had taken place was a romance of circumstances, he was certain. Surely Jericho had to know he was all wrong for Evie. Jericho spent his nights reading or painting Civil War models. Evie was a bearcat, the life of the party. She’d eat him alive. The more Sam thought about it, the more he came to think that it was better this way. He’d snooped in Jericho’s room, looking for clues to Project Buffalo, and he’d found the letters that Jericho had started to Evie and never sent. It bordered on what his old man would call nebbishy. This phony romance would give Jericho time to lick the last of his wounds and move on. In four weeks, he’d be a new man. It would be, “Evie who?” And Sam would help Jericho along. He owed the giant that much. In fact, he’d be doing the big lug a favor.

  “Listen, pal, I feel lousy about the way you found out about Evie and me. Let me make it up to you. How’s about you and me go out on the town sometime, huh?”

  Jericho narrowed his eyes. “You. And me.”

  “We could go to the fights, or head to the Kentucky Club to hear Duke Ellington play. I could introduce you to some girls. It’d be swell times!” He gave Jericho his most convincing smile.

  Jericho didn’t return it. “I’m not going to dignify that with a response, especially when we have more important matters to tend to. We’ve got a museum to save and an exhibit to put together, if you recall.”

  Sam figured it was best to leave the giant his pride and change the subject. At least they could agree on saving the museum. “What’ve we got so far?”

  Sam followed Jericho to a table that held a paltry assortment of items. “Let’s see. We got a gris gris bag. Liberty Anne’s diary. A very shriveled mandrake root…” Sam held the grizzled thing up to the light. “Or possibly the world’s hairiest potato. And something that looks like chicken bones?”

  Jericho swiped the bones into a trash can. “Last night’s dinner.”

  Sam held up a photograph with a gauzy white smear in the background. “Is this a spirit photograph, or is that mayonnaise?”

  Jericho snatched the ghostly tintype away. “Spirit photograph.”

  Sam picked through the rest of the meager collection, his hopes flagging. “This is it? It’s not any different from what we already got going on.”

  “Sam, this entire museum is a Diviners exhibit. I don’t see why you haven’t grasped this yet.”

  “This is gonna be a three-legged dog of an exhibit,” Sam grumbled. “Buncha spooky knickknacks and haunted doilies. Nobody’s gonna line up for this junk!”

  “I’ll remind you that this was your idea.” Jericho spread his arms wide in challenge. “Fine. Why don’t you curate this exhibit, then? See what you come up with.”

  Jericho headed to the collections room, and Sam followed, complaining.

  “Gimme something to work with. A curse. The bloodstained waistcoat of a murdered aristocrat. A hotsy-totsy medium who, uh, felt the spirits move through her, if you catch my drift—ouch!” Sam said, tripping over a spot on the rug that sent him tumbling into a sideboard.

  “Watch it,” Jericho said, steadying the sideboard. “These are rare artifacts.”

  “Thanks for your concern. I’m fine,” Sam muttered. He pulled back the rug, exposing the scarred outline of a door with a metal ring attached. “That’s the culprit,” Sam said, tugging on the ring. “What is this?”

  “An old cellar.”

  “No kidding. What’s in it?”

  Jericho shrugged.

  “Hold on—you’ve never been down in the cellar?”

  “No. Why would I?”

  “Freddy, it could be a gold mine down there!” Sam tried the ring again. It wouldn’t budge. “I gotta loosen around these boards. Hand me that sword up there, will ya?”

  “You mean this antique that’s probably worth more than you are?” Jericho shook his head slowly.

  “Fine!” Sam flicked open his Swiss Army knife and sawed the blade arou
nd the edges of the door as best he could to loosen the thick layers of sticky, packed dust, but the door still wouldn’t give.

  Jericho sighed. “Here. Move.” He grasped the ring with one hand and gave a slight pull, and the door creaked open.

  “Holy smokes, Hercules. What are they feeding you?”

  Jericho coughed as the dust spiraled up in thick clouds.

  “I coulda opened it, you know,” Sam added.

  “No, you couldn’t.”

  “I was this close.”

  “Wrong.” Jericho waved away the last of the dust motes circling in the air. A perilous-looking wooden staircase draped in cobwebs led down into the gloom. “You think those stairs are still any good?”

  “Only one way to find out,” Sam said. “Let’s grab some flashlights.”

  The wood protested loudly under Sam and Jericho’s sudden weight as the two of them made their way down the old steps into the dark hole, their flashlight beams bouncing across the fragile architecture of cobwebs. They jumped to the bottom, landing on a dirt floor in a large room connected to a long, narrow passageway.

  Sam whistled. “The bootleggers would kill for this.”

  He and Jericho walked the passageway, which was scribbled and scratched with names: James Beardon. Moses Johnson. Maisie Lafayette and children. My name is Osay. There were several X’s instead of names, and a vast mural whose muted colors were ghosts of their former hues. In it, a slave family entered a promised land of bright sun and leafy trees. High above the sun’s rays, someone had etched the word freedom. The mural had clearly been painted by several different hands over time, each artist adding to the story, but the message was the same.

  “Looks like the Transcontinental wasn’t the only railroad Cornelius Rathbone built,” Jericho said, shining a light around the cavernous space.

  Sam’s mother used to say that inside everyone was the chance to change the world. It sat like a seed eager to grow into greatness. The professor could have his ghosts. Ordinary people were capable of extraordinary bravery. That was the only magic Sam knew or trusted.

  “What are we looking for down here?” Jericho asked.

  “Not sure,” Sam answered. His light fell upon a closed door nestled in an alcove. “But this might be a good place to start.” He tried the knob. “Locked.”

  From his pocket, Sam again pulled out his Swiss Army knife and stuck the point of it into the keyhole.

  “Hold on: Are you breaking in?”

  “Ish,” Sam said, wobbling his hand in a more-or-less motion.

  Jericho leaned against the brick, shaking his head. “You’re something else.”

  “C’mon, Freddy,” Sam goaded, still trying to jimmy the lock. “Is your curiosity button on the fritz?”

  “No. Neither is my code-of-ethics button. Maybe you can ask Santa to bring you one of those for Christmas.”

  “What if inside this very room is just what we need to save our Diviners exhibit? You think about that?”

  Jericho pondered the point, then exhaled loudly. “Fine.”

  He pushed off from the wall and turned the doorknob roughly. The door opened easily. “It wasn’t even locked. Just needed some strength,” he said, stooping to get through the low doorway.

  “I coulda done that,” Sam said again, following.

  Sam and Jericho’s flashlight beams bounced around the dank, cramped, cold room, which had been stuffed with all sorts of oddities—oil paintings, broken furniture, a dressmaker’s form, and even a sarcophagus, which hung open on a broken hinge. Two stacks of crates had been shoved into a corner against a large mural, aged and worn by moisture in spots. This mural wasn’t hopeful like the other ones in the museum; it was a complex nightmare in paint. In a dark, denuded forest of the sort found in fairy tales stood a spindly gray carnival barker of a man wearing a tall hat and a coat of black feathers. His outstretched palm bore a glowing symbol: an eye with a jagged lightning bolt underneath. Behind the gray man lay a long line of frightening specters. They all seemed to be advancing on a young Negro man. The number 144 appeared in the broken sky above.

  “What’s it say there?” Jericho asked. Beneath the mural, someone had painted words. He stepped closer, squinting to make them out. “‘Beware… the King of… Crows.’”

  “Cheery,” Sam joked, though the disturbing mural gave him the shivers. He thought it might just be the spookiest thing in the entire Creepy Crawly. “Let’s see what we got,” he said, turning away from it. He lifted a piece of grimy, rusted equipment from one of the crates. His shoulders sagged. “Junk. That’s the one thing we’re not short on in this place.”

  All the crates were nailed shut except for one, which had been partially broken. Jericho reached in and pulled out a sheaf of yellowed papers.

  “Hey, what’s that?” Sam came and stood beside Jericho.

  “If I had to guess, I’d say probably none of your business,” Jericho said, glancing down at the page.

  “That’s my favorite kind of business.…”

  “‘The last will and testament of Cornelius Rathbone, recorded this day, the fourth of January, in the year of our Lord, one thousand, nine hundred and seventeen,’” Jericho read aloud. “‘I, Cornelius Thaddeus Rathbone, being of sound mind and body, do hereby bequeath my house and all its worldly belongings to William John Fitzgerald, with the proviso that he must continue our most important work.…’”

  “Old Man Rathbone left this place to the professor?” Sam said, incredulous.

  Jericho stared at the document. Years ago, he had asked Will how he’d come to run the museum. Will’s story was that he’d bought the dilapidated museum just ahead of the city’s wrecking ball. Cornelius Rathbone’s last will and testament proved that wasn’t true.

  But why would Will lie to Jericho about it?

  Quickly, Jericho moved on to the second page, a letter.

  “What’s that one say?” Sam asked.

  “It’s from Cornelius to Will, dated January thirty-first, 1917. ‘Dear William…’” Jericho read aloud.

  This letter shall be my last, I fear, for I wait on Death’s doorstep, and soon, He shall bade me enter into that house of eternal rest. For these past many years, I could not forgive you the sin of your ambition for leaving me behind to work with the “great minds” of President Roosevelt’s ridiculous Department of Paranormal—

  “Wait, Teddy Roosevelt?” Sam asked.

  “Yes, Sam. Theodore Roosevelt. Large man with a big mustache. Was our president for a bit. May I continue?”

  “Go on,” Sam grumbled.

  It was I, however, who was ridiculous. It is imperative that we put aside our differences and work together in one last endeavor while there is still time. What I previously showed you of Liberty Anne’s prophecies was not all. Toward the end of her days, there followed far more disturbing warnings, dire predictions for the nation. At the time, I feared that her fever, which raged so fiercely, had addled her wits. For this reason, I locked away her final prophecy. I see now that I was remiss to have hidden this unholy correspondence from you. I fear we have underestimated the power of the man in the stovepipe hat.

  My time grows short. I implore you: Let us bury selfish quarrels before it is too late.

  Ever hopeful,

  Cornelius

  “You know what this is, don’t you?” Sam said, waving the letter in the air. “A gold mine! It’s the hook we need to make our Diviners exhibit a hot ticket: ‘Read the never-before-revealed prophecies of Liberty Anne Rathbone! Hear her dire predictions for the citizens of America before it’s too late!’ We just gotta hope Liberty Anne’s prophecies are somewhere in these boxes.”

  “Only one way to find out. Let’s bring it all upstairs and have a look through everything,” Jericho answered, easily hoisting one of the crates onto his shoulder and ducking back through the doorway.

  “Yeah. I was afraid you’d say that,” Sam said, grunting as he shouldered the heavy load.

  “That’s all of them
,” Jericho said as he carried in the last crate.

  Sam fell onto the couch, gasping. “I may never use my arms again,” he moaned.

  “No doubt the girls of New York City sigh in relief,” Jericho muttered, trying not to think about Sam’s arms around Evie. “Let’s see what we’ve got.”

  There were six crates in total, and every one had been nailed shut except for the damaged one containing Rathbone’s will. Sam reached into it. “Books,” he said with a sigh, pulling out musty tomes that released even more filth and dust into the air. “Always with the books.” Next was a cache of letters from Will to somebody named Rotke Wasserman in Hopeful Harbor, New York. Sam sneaked one from its weary envelope.

  “‘My Darling Rotke… I miss you like the flower misses sun…’” Sam read aloud. He whistled long and loud. “Now we’re getting somewhere.”

  “Have some decency, Sam,” Jericho growled, snatching the letter away.

  Sam put his hands up. “Okay, okay. Don’t get hot. Who’s this Rotke tomato?”

  “She’s not a tomato. Rotke was Will’s fianceé. She died during the war,” Jericho said, tucking the letter back into the crate. “This doesn’t feel ethical.”

  “Ethics don’t pay the taxman, Freddy. Listen, we’ll just have a look. If we don’t find Liberty Anne’s unholy correspondence, we’ll put the whole mess back in the cellar and forget about it, and nobody’ll be the wiser. Deal?”

  “Yes. Okay. Fine.”

  “We’re gonna need a crowbar to loosen those others,” Sam said, sneezing again. “Don’t suppose there’s one around here?”

  “Somewhere,” Jericho said, wiping his hands on his trousers. “I’ll be right back. Don’t steal anything.”

  “Who’d wanna steal this bunk?” Sam muttered, rummaging through the books. He opened one and saw Rotke’s name scrawled on the inside cover. Pictures had been sandwiched between its pages: one of a younger, blonder Will holding a tennis racket; one of him posing with an old Negro woman above a handwritten note—Will and Mama Thibault, Diviner, New Orleans, 1906; a grainy photograph of some fancy estate. Sam flipped the page and came to a few yellowed newspaper clippings of the sort Will liked to collect: articles about small-town mediums or people who could bend spoons with their thoughts; an odd mention of an Indian village that burned to the ground, killing everyone, after a stove blew up.