“No, Pulgrum. No outbreak.” Martin reached out to shake hands. “Our patient here seems to have contracted the only case I am aware of at the moment. Such random instances are hardly rare.”
Constance felt, more than saw, the sweep of the doctor’s hand away from her toward the wharves and the port. A chill swept through her. She took a ragged breath, as if she were trying to stop weeping. She turned her head, searching for her children. Alice had gone to them to distract their attention. Constance took in the scene. They must not witness their mother being arrested. They must not see this. She was acutely aware of the two men’s eyes on her now.
“Constance? You’re not having chills again?”
Martin was instantly at her side, the back of his hand against her cheek. She was aware enough to know that her mind had gone empty. She glanced up at Martin in helplessness.
“Perhaps we’ve had you out too long.”
She heard his words as if from a distance and felt him lifting her to standing.
“Pulgrum, will you excuse us, please?”
Martin guided her toward the back door. She could feel his bracing support. She was utterly dependent on it. Without it, she would collapse. She could hear Alice and Analee urging the children to pick up the hobbyhorse and the ball and come inside.
“I have something important to speak to Mrs. Halstead about, Doctor.”
Constance’s head was thrumming; her pulse pounding against her temples.
“As you can see, Pulgrum. Mrs. Halstead is hardly in good health at the moment.”
Constance heard, rather than saw, the latch on the opening door, the clack of Martin’s shoe against it to hold it as he guided her inside. The children’s chattering voices reached her from a distance.
“It’s of the most crucial importance, Doctor.” Pulgrum’s dogged steps followed them onto the porch. His voice sounded as if it had come from somewhere far away, and echoed in her ears. “I beg pardon, Doctor.” Pulgrum was not backing off. “This is of the utmost importance. Perhaps if you assist Mrs. Halstead to a seat and stabilize her for a few minutes, I can deliver this news regarding her husband’s death.”
“Is this really the time?” Martin turned on Pulgrum in a flare of anger.
“I can wait.” Pulgrum took a step back.
Constance could feel an opening of the space around her as he did so. She wanted to weep. Would he have mercy on her, after all?
Alice and Analee passed by with the children, who had gone quiet now. Constance heard their footsteps going up the stairs, heard the two women’s muffled instructions about dolls and toys, and the closing of a door, the quiet steps of the women’s return.
Martin guided Constance into the drawing room. When she was safely seated, she felt his hand again on her forehead, then firmly encircling her wrist to count her pulse. She could feel it pumping hard against his fingers. And in her ribs, her head, her neck. Her fear had taken hold of every cell. She opened her mouth. With everything that was in her, she wanted to scream. But that would terrify her girls. She would not leave them in an even greater panic than her simple surrender, her walking handcuffed out the door, would induce. She had a sense her body might suddenly explode.
“I’ll see if I can’t get rid of that man,” Martin said as he touched the crocheted afghan Alice had tucked around her. “Whatever he wants can wait.”
“I assure you, Doctor, unless Mrs. Halstead is still truly ill, my errand here is not one to wait.”
Constance startled. She had not been aware that Pulgrum had followed them in from the porch. Martin stood up straight and made himself an obstacle between his patient and the police officer. Alice and Analee backed away but stood firmly behind her, each with a hand on her shoulder.
Pulgrum sidestepped Martin and extended his hand toward Constance, something small and flat in his fingers. A photograph. “We have the evidence we have been seeking to confirm Mr. Halstead’s murder.” He came closer, waving the photograph for her to take.
Martin was behind him and grabbed the extended photograph.
Constance, now still and numb inside herself, held out her hand. “Let me have it, Martin.” Her voice had gone quiet, resigned.
She could see the reluctance with which he relinquished it to her. She examined the faces of the two men before her, one stoic, one afraid. Why should Martin be afraid? Did he suspect the truth? Had the words of her delirium reached his ears as well as Analee’s? She felt Analee’s grip on her shoulder. Analee knew.
Constance raised the small bit of photographic paper, tilted it in the light. There she was. Not herself, but some bushy-faced young man, turned marginally away from the camera, one imprecise hand raised. There was Benton, off balance, blurred, unrecognizable, his distorted body akimbo, taking flight. And there was the man of her nightmares: the man who had threatened her children, who had tried to extort her money, the wiry, strangely mustached rogue of the Black Hand who had twisted her with fear for her children, for herself. The man who had darted across that train vestibule as Benton fell. There he was, arm extended, his hand against Benton’s chest, an expression akin to glee on that threateningly mustached face.
“We have him, Mrs. Halstead. We have your husband’s murderer. We apprehended him last night, or rather this morning. Well after midnight. Over in the Quarter. He is in the precinct jail and will remain there until we believe we have everything he has to give us.”
Constance sat in bewildered relief, her terror melting only slowly, her fear and guilt transforming little by little as the certainty that had eluded her solidified within her. She stared at the photo, the clear image of another’s hand shoving Benton from the train, a hand that had tortured her children. A hand that did not belong to her. Here, finally, it began to sink into her body, her heart, her spirit at last that she was not to blame. Yes, he had been shocked to recognize her eyes, but it had not been the surprise of her eyes that had caused him to lose his balance, to fall to a horrid death. I did not murder him, she thought. I did not kill him with the surprise of my just being there. I did not kill my husband.
“Where did you get this photograph, Officer? How?” Martin quizzed him.
Analee’s hand relaxed on Constance’s shoulder. Constance felt the steady warmth of it coursing through her and breathed. Things were slowly making sense to her.
“Well, quite a story there, Doctor. Quite a story. Young photographer came to the precinct last week to give it to us. Seems he was on that train with his family. Had one of those portable box cameras Kodak came up with. Man was letting his little boy experiment with it, taking photos to keep the child entertained. Boy got all excited and ran off to the vestibule door before the father managed to settle him down and give him a book to read.”
Pulgrum shifted his weight and twisted his cap in his now free hands. “Anyway, seems those box cameras . . . They really are just a box with some sort of lens . . . So the whole thing has to be shipped back to Kodak up in Rochester to be developed and reloaded. Takes a while. Father got it all back in the mail, flipped through the shots. Nothing but blur, for the most part, and he started to just toss the whole stack. But there was one of an old man with a walrus mustache, which the kids had thought was funny and wanted to keep. And at the bottom of the stash was this. He’d read about Mr. Halstead’s death in the papers. Blurred, for sure, but clear enough to see this man pushing him from the train. Clear enough for an arrest, though it’s taken us some time to find the devil. Clear enough for a conviction.”