Bess clutched the letters to her chest as the clock struck nine. She looked at it, panic setting in. The first trains out of New York began running at five in the morning. Charles could very well be in New Jersey already.
“Gladys,” she breathed urgently. “We have to go after him.” She scribbled a note for George asking him to call Niall about the tearoom; then she grabbed her fringed wrap from the hall closet and flung open the front door.
“What are you going to tell him?”
“Everything. And we’re going to finish piecing together Harry’s message.”
The one thing Bess couldn’t understand, still, as she and Gladys climbed into a taxicab, was why, if Harry was indeed able to communicate with her, as it seemed he was, he would have chosen a method so vague. Why wasn’t he simply able to appear to her in a mirror, say, or a dream? Or through a medium? Why all these preposterous clues?
Fifteen minutes later, they emerged from the taxi onto the street corner in front of the terminal. The building was a shining architectural gem, which stood imposingly, its domed windows like the eyes of a giant stone monster. The sunlight gave the rooms inside a dusty, pearl-like glimmer. Bess’s hands trembled. She had to find Charles. She felt as if she were on the edge of a precipice.
The massive vestibule was scattered with tired passengers sitting on their luggage, waiting for the trains. Many were sleeping on the benches that ran along the walls. Bess searched the room. Maybe Charles had been bluffing about leaving town. It was possible he was still sleeping at this very moment in some cheap hotel.
But he was there. He stood, his back to her, on the marble staircase, looking at the clock. His coat was hanging over his elbow, and he had one foot on the next step above, looking like a man she had seen before, a man who had waited for her on staircases all over the world. As she approached him, he turned. And for a shimmering moment, he could almost have been young Ehrich Weiss, coming to take her back to Coney Island, to have dinner at the Brighton Beach Hotel.
“Why don’t you sing anymore?” Harry had asked her. “I miss your singing.” It was a Sunday in Atlantic City; they were waiting for a ride on the carousel, which had been dubbed the Palace of Flying Animals. Hymnals were being passed out for riders to sing along to organ music as they rode.
The funny thing was, she didn’t know why she had stopped singing. She could not even remember the words to most of her old songs. She had had a good voice, once.
Harry had handed their tokens to the operator. “You’ll go on the Flip-Flap Railroad with me after this, won’t you?” His eyes had gleamed.
“Certainly not.” The railroad went upside down, in a loop, next to the pier. Many riders had said it had damaged their backs. “You know your body can’t handle that kind of stress.”
He had laughed and raised his eyebrows suggestively. “My dear, my body can handle anything.”
She’d swatted at him. “You shouldn’t be vulgar, Harry. You’re a public figure now.”
“Charles, thank God. I thought you’d be gone.” Bess stood at the base of the staircase looking up at the young man, her arm looped through Gladys’s elbow. Her lower lip quivered. She reached into her purse and thrust the postcard toward him. “I have to know if you’ve seen this before.”
Charles looked at her with suspicion. “What are you doing here?” He stared at her outstretched hand and seemed to consider it for a moment disdainfully. Finally, he took the card and studied it. His expression changed. “This is my photograph,” he said. “It was one of the first photographs I ever sold. I was only seventeen.” He looked up at her, his expression still mistrustful. “Why did you come all the way here to show me this?”
Bess lowered her voice. “Harry’s brought us together to tell us something, Charles. Please don’t leave. I was wrong to accuse you of lying. You are his son. Certainly, deep down, you know this. Harry Houdini was your father.”
Chapter 13
HOLLYWOOD
June 1923
“Well, Mrs. Houdini.” Harry stood in the doorway to the back garden, grinning at her. “We’ve made it now.” He waved a heavy canvas-covered book in the air. “We’re in the dictionary!”
Bess closed her novel and blinked at him through the sunlight. “What are you going on about?”
Harry opened the book and began to read. “ ‘To Houdinize: Verb. To release or extricate oneself, from confinement, bonds, and the like, as by wriggling out.’ Ha!” He slammed the book shut again and scooped her off the bench and kissed her.
In a few hours they would be standing outside the Los Angeles premiere of his most recent motion picture, Haldane of the Secret Service. The theater was expecting crowds in the thousands.
“Tonight, darling, you should wear the white dress that I love so much.”
“But we’re still going for a swim with the Londons first? It’s so hot.”