The Last Illusion

“I never went, after all,” I said, deciding to leave out the part about being kidnapped. “It proved to be unnecessary.”


“Molly dear, you’re looking pale and worn out.” Sid came to join her at the front door, looking dramatic in black silk trousers and a black cape lined with red. “Come to supper with us, and then we’re going to see a most amusing show at the Empire. We plan to chuckle merrily all evening. It would be good for you.”

“I’m sure it would,” I said, “but I have a client I can’t leave at the moment and work that has to be done.”

“I find that the whole concept of work is overrated,” Sid said. “I’m sure God never intended people to work all day—why else would he have put Adam and Eve in a delightful garden with everything they needed around them?”

“They were cast out because of sin, remember?” I pointed out. “That’s why we have to work. Because of Eve and that stupid apple.”

“We refuse to accept responsibility for Eve and the apple,” Sid said. “Don’t we, Gus? Our creed is that life is made to be enjoyed every single moment.”

“It’s all right if you have money to live like that,” I said.

“You’ll be married to Daniel soon and be a pampered wife,” Gus said, with an amused glance at Sid. “Then you’ll find out what you’ve been missing.”

“Maybe,” I said, “but in the meantime, I have a job to do and I have come to ask if I might use your new telephone to call Daniel.”

“By all means. Any time. Our telephone is your telephone. . . .” Gus waved me toward the contraption on the wall.

I asked to be connected to police headquarters, only to be told that Captain Sullivan wasn’t there. I left a message that Miss Murphy was home but planning to spend the night with Bess Houdini, then I called his apartment. Nobody answered there, so I decided I had done all I could, and set off back up to Harlem. I had just turned onto Sixth Avenue when a furious honking of an automobile horn made me look around. The auto came to an abrupt halt beside me and I saw that the person behind the motoring goggles was Daniel.

“There you are at last,” he snapped, opening the passenger door for me to get in beside him. “Where the devil have you been?”

Passersby stopped to observe with interest.

“I had some things that needed to be done,” I replied with dignity.

“I’ve been looking for you all day,” he said. “Come on. Climb in. We are holding up traffic!”

Oh, I was so tempted to say that I didn’t need a ride, thank you, and I’d prefer to take the train, but my curiosity won out over my pride. If he’d been looking for me, he might have important news he wished me to know.

I hitched up my skirts, showing an improper amount of ankle, and negotiated the high step into the automobile.

“There’s no need to shout,” I said as we drove off, swerving around a parked carriage.

“I have every reason to shout,” he said. “You were going to Atlantic City, weren’t you? Against my express wishes.”

“I hardly went to Atlantic City, conducted my business, and then returned, unless I’ve developed wings,” I replied.

“Then you must have seen sense at the last moment,” he snapped, “because you were observed getting on the ferry to the rail terminus.”

“You are having me followed these days?” I demanded angrily. “Am I a suspected criminal? Or do you plan to have a man on my tail every day after we are married, just to make sure I behave myself?”

“I had men observing the ferry in case Houdini was spotted trying to sneak out of town,” he said. “One of my men recognized you.”

I gave him a frosty stare as we came to a halt behind a jitney that had stopped to let off passengers. “Then let me just reiterate that I did not go to Atlantic City, as you must have now realized, given that I am already back in the city.”

“But you were going to go, weren’t you? And common sense won out at the last moment?”

I gave him a long stare. “I can truthfully say that common sense did not win out at the last moment.”

“Then where did you go?”

“Daniel, you know very well that I can’t discuss my cases with you, any more than you discuss yours with me,” I said. “Suffice it to say that my business is concluded. I didn’t meet with any murderers, and I will not have to leave town again.”

“You realize that this is not your case any longer, Molly. Your client is either kidnapped, dead, or on the run from police. Either way this is now a criminal case and you are to have nothing more to do with it, do you understand?”

“Keep your hair on, Daniel. I might have other cases on the books, you know. Other perfectly simple, normal divorce cases that involve my gadding around town at odd moments, and about which I can’t tell you.”

“You are infuriating, do you know that?” he stormed. “I was worried sick about you, Molly. Don’t you realize that I worry about you all the time?”