Mrs. Houdini(66)

The sky was ripe with the first hushed light of morning, and there was a soft knock at the door. Of course Charles had come back; where else would he go? She felt strangely relieved. But it was not Charles standing at her doorstep. It was Gladys.

“What are you doing here at this hour?” Bess asked. “Is everything all right?”

“I came to check on you.”

“To check on me? How did you even know I’d be up?”

“I returned to the city last night, actually. I needed to talk to you.”

George, who had come off his leave an hour earlier, entered the room, his uniform freshly pressed. “Is everything all right, Mrs. Houdini?”

Bess pulled Gladys into the house and sat her down on the sofa, then turned to the butler. “Would you get us some tea?”

When George had retreated into the kitchen, Gladys said, “You know he’s Harry’s son, don’t you?”

Bess grabbed her hand. “Why do you say that?”

“I knew the moment I touched his face. He has the same bone structure as Harry did. Almost exactly the same. And his voice—I wasn’t sure I should say anything, but I couldn’t stay at the party. I had Lloyd call me a car soon after you left.” She lowered her voice. “Where is he? Is he asleep?”

Bess shook her head. “I sent him away, actually. We had an argument. I accused him . . . of trying to steal from me.” She put her head in her hands. “Did you know all these years that Harry had a son? Tell me the truth.”

Gladys shook her head fiercely. “I swear I didn’t.”

“Are you completely certain he is Harry’s son? I thought he was trying to deceive me.”

Gladys pushed a strand of loose hair behind her ear. “I’m sorry, Bess.”

Bess was shaken. Had she made a mistake in sending Charles away? Was she wrong that he had planted the photograph in the library? She couldn’t bear the alternative—that Harry had kept the photograph a secret from her, had known for years that he had a son. That their inability to have children had, all along, been her fault and not his. Instead of searching the house for something Harry may have left her for her future, apparently she should have been searching for evidence of his deception.

She could not understand why Harry would have made his transgressions clear now, when he was not here to console her or explain to her. Why now, when he had kept the secret from her his entire life? Even on his deathbed, he had mentioned no affair, no lost son, no photograph hidden in the library. It was unbearable to recall the afternoon of Harry’s death, the way he’d gripped her hand and looked at her with such unspeakable adoration. To think that even then—in that final moment of brutal honesty—he was concealing something from her . . .

She looked at the clock; it was six in the morning now. She opened the last of the curtains, and yellow light poured in. In the center of the room, by the fire, was the leather sofa, and Harry’s armchair, where he’d liked to close his eyes and rehearse his tricks before he fell asleep. Stuffed in the crevices between Harry’s books were papers of all kinds—documents, letters, photographs. She had spent hours over the years opening volume after volume, searching for something that would alleviate her financial burden; but she had found nothing of value. After Harry’s passing, George had offered to help her clear the room. At the time, she had contemplated selling the house and moving to California, but when she couldn’t bring herself to touch Harry’s things, she realized she could not go anywhere; she was a prisoner of her old life, forever.

Even with the room bathed in light, she had the eerie sensation that they were being watched. She rushed to the windows and flung the curtains closed. She stood there feeling as if she was in not her own home but a stranger’s, waiting for the owners to return.

“It was that woman from the circus that night, wasn’t it?” Gladys murmured.

“How did you know about that?”

“Stella told me, a long time ago.”

Bess sighed. “Yes. It was her.”

Gladys pressed her hand onto Bess’s. “This doesn’t change anything,” she said. “He still loved you with all his heart.”

Bess laughed cruelly. “Of course he didn’t.”

“He did, Bess. He loved you more than anything.”

Bess felt the tears streaming down her face. She had tried so hard, her whole life, to keep her emotions to herself. But now she couldn’t help it. “If he loved me so much,” she demanded, “why would he want to hurt me so badly?”

“What do you mean? That’s why he kept it from you all these years, probably. So he didn’t hurt you.”

“No.” Bess stood up and began pacing the room. “You don’t understand. It wasn’t a coincidence that I happened to meet Charles when I was in Atlantic City. I went down there specifically to see him. Harry told me to go.”

Gladys looked at her, shocked. “What are you talking about? You mean you—you got through to him after all?”

“Think about it. Do you really think, of all the millions of people in this world, that I would have just happened upon Harry’s lost son? It was Harry’s doing.” She had been wanting to speak those words for so long that they seemed sacred, profound. She took a deep breath. “I’ve never told anyone this, but Harry left me a second code—in case the first one made its way into the wrong hands. No one could have possibly known the code but me—we never said it out loud, not once. And a few weeks ago, I came across pieces of this very code in some photographs—both of which were taken by Charles Radley.”