The Crack in the Lens by Steve Hockensmith Read Free Book Online Page A

this?”
    I stepped past him into the room. The Bridal Suite, Big Bess had called it downstairs. But it wasn’t pure and virginal in any sense but one: Lord knows it had never been touched by either scrub brush or broom. It was probably a good sight larger than the Phoenix’s other “cribs,” though, sporting as it did an actual four-poster bed instead of a mere cot or mat. There were other cozy touches, too—a threadbare rug on the floor, a portrait of Abraham Lincoln (with inked-in eyeglasses and devil horns) on the wall, a nightstand upon which sat a stained chamber pot and a cracked vase holding a single black, shrivel-petaled rose.
    “Very romantic,” I said.
    “Yeah, well, it’s the best we got around here.” Big Bess shuffled straight to the bed and spread herself out upon it. Trollop and bedsprings alike let out a loud sigh. “This is where we take the big spenders. Any other room, and Stonewall’d get suspicious if I wasn’t back in ten minutes.”
    “I don’t aim to be here longer than that anyhow,” Gustav said. “We wasted enough time already haulin’ my brother up here.”
    “Keep your shirt on, Gus,” Big Bess said through a yawn. For a woman who did most of her work on her back, she sure seemed tired. “Like I said before—down there he’d just get himself in another brawl.” She pointed her next yawn at me. “What were you thinkin’, comin’ in a place like this dressed like that?”
    “He’ll tell you,” I sighed, nodding at my brother.
    “We weren’t thinkin’,” Old Red said.
    At least he’d made it a “we.” That was more than I’d expected.
    “So you two know each other?” I said to Big Bess.
    “Gloomy Gus and me? Oh, we go way back.”
    “Bess worked at the Eagle with Adeline,” Gustav explained. “She was the only gal downstairs I recognized.”
    Big Bess nodded, her multitudinous chins doubling with each downward dip.
    “Yeah, me and Squirrel Tooth Annie are the only ones left outta the whole bunch.”
    “Squirrel Tooth’s still around? I didn’t spot her workin’ the floor.”
    Big Bess shrugged. “Must be with a customer.”
    “What happened to the others? Sunshine and Belle and the rest?”
    “Oh, you know. Married local hands or took sick or got too old.”
    The chippie’s sleepy-eyed gaze drifted over to the painting facing her from the wall, though she seemed to see something there other than Honest Abe—something she didn’t care for. Her future, perhaps, approaching fast.
    “The usual,” she muttered, “but it’s not all them others you’re here to talk about, is it?”
    “That’s right,” Old Red said. “What can you tell me about the night Adeline died?”
    Big Bess stroked her wattles. “Ohhhh, nothing you ain’t heard before, I expect. She got sent over to the Star and she never come back. I hate to say it, but I was busy at the time, y’know? Workin’.”
    “Who told her to go?”
    “Mr. Bock, most likely. He’s always been in charge of the ‘room service’ at the Star.”
    “That’s still goin’ on? Even with Bales crackin’ down in town?”
    Big Bess scoffed. “Bales? What can he do? There’s no law against a woman rentin’ a room…or wanderin’ into the wrong one ‘by mistake.’”
    “How about that night five years ago?” Old Red said. “Did Bock or Ragsdale ever mention who Adeline was sent over to the Star for?”
    “Oh, yeah. Pete…Mr. Ragsdale. He came right out and told us who done it.”
    My brother took a lurching step toward the bed, eyes wide. If only it could be this easy…
    “ Who? ”
    “Some stranger passin’ through. Signed into the Star under a fake name and skipped out that same night.”
    Gustav sagged—head bowed, shoulders slumped.
    Then Big Bess went on, and he wilted even worse.
    “Mr. Ragsdale says he never came back. Ain’t nobody seen hide nor hair of the man in five years.”

7

Frame Job
    Or, Gustav and I Find Ourselves Painted into a Corner
    My brother looked as