Mrs. Houdini(74)

“And . . . could you?”

Harry shook his head. “He’s been to everyone I would have seen.”

“Oh, God,” Bess said. “Is he really—?”

Harry nodded.

My little lump of sugar down in Dixie, mine all mine, Jolson sang. The room seemed to still around her. The doors to the patio were open and the room was cool with the breeze and the women’s long dresses rustled as they danced.

Suddenly none of it seemed to matter any longer—the celebrity, the ocean, the lemon trees in the yard—and the sense that she had her own work, her own value, in Hollywood. She would, Bess realized, leave it all behind for Harry. For perhaps the first time in his career, it wasn’t about the money for him. He was asking her to leave California because the place had broken him. People didn’t understand that the tricks he did on screen were authentic, that they nearly cost him his life every time. Another actor could replicate them any day with a few well-placed camera angles. His talent was in live performance, where audiences could believe that his magic was real. In Hollywood everything—romances, magic—was manufactured. Harry could never be the Great Houdini in Hollywood. And he couldn’t live without being the Great Houdini.

“I bet we’re the only people in here who’ve actually been to Dixie,” Bess said quietly. “Remember the tiny trailer we used to live in?”

Harry smiled. “I had to cut holes in the walls of our bedroom, just to try to get some relief from the hot nights.”

“Those were some crazy years.”

Harry’s face crumpled. “Don’t you see, Bess? I’m yours till the end. In this life, and after.”





Chapter 14


CENTRAL PIER


June 1929


The house was not at all what she expected. It stood, a monument of gray stone, four blocks from the ocean, the porch white as washed linen. The grass was cut to an inch in height, and, inside, the rooms were shining. There were no dishes in the sink, and no shoes in the hall. A single black hat hung on a rack by the door. She would never have guessed that a single man lived there.

“Do you own this?” she asked, running her hands along the wooden banister. She turned to Gladys to describe it. “It’s nearly perfect.”

Charles shrugged. “I purchased it a few years ago. Thinking, perhaps, I would have a family one day.”

“You still can,” she said. “You don’t have to be a priest, you know. It’s not too late to choose a different path.”

He continued to surprise her. She had not expected him to forgive her so quickly at the train station, nor had she expected that he would have agreed to let her go back to New Jersey with him. But she was certain now that Harry had brought them together, for some greater purpose.

It made sense, now, why Harry had refused to adopt a child all those years. All along, he had been looking for his own son. Adopting someone else’s son while his own was out in the world without him must have seemed unbearable.

Bess looked through the window onto the green, square yard. The house, on the eastern side of Ventnor, was far from the chaos of the Atlantic City tourist area. The lawns of the neighboring houses were cluttered with children’s bicycles.

“It’s a very pretty neighborhood.”

“Yes, I feel sometimes I don’t quite fit in here.”

The walls, she noticed, were peculiarly bare. In the hallway he had framed three photographs of the boardwalk, which, she assumed, he had taken for the newspaper. Besides these, there was no other artwork in the house. There were no photographs of family or friends, no stacks of books lying about, no indication of what kind of man lived there at all. It was a beautiful, empty house, and he seemed to her suddenly a very lonely boy who was pretending to be grown up. She saw now that he hadn’t really come to a decision about his future at all.

She wandered into the parlor, where a tiny upholstered sofa stood, alone, in the center of the room. Charles leaned against the doorway, his hands in his pockets, enjoying the look of surprise on her face as she explored the house.

“You know, Charles, I was wrong about you. I accused you of deception and selfishness—all the bad sides of Harry, perhaps. But the truth is you have many of his good qualities. I don’t think you’ve let the boy grow out of you yet. That was one thing about Harry. He was always young. Even as I got older, he was always young.”

Charles’s smirk disappeared. “I know you’re certain he was trying to find me all those years. But what if you’re wrong? What if he knew where I was all along? I’m not sure I want to be his son.” On the train, Bess and Gladys had shown him the letters they’d found in Harry’s desk. Charles had confirmed that his name had indeed once been Romario Tardo.

“He didn’t know,” Gladys said. “Truly he didn’t.” She lowered herself onto the sofa, and Bess sat next to her.

“What I am certain of,” Bess said, “is that there is some sort of message he’s trying to send, and you’re the only one who can help decipher it.” She reached up and clasped his hand. “You’re the key to all of this.” Her fingers trembled as she took the postcard from her purse. “You read the newspapers when Arthur Ford revealed the code Harry left for me. I suppose . . . I could have loved Arthur, given enough time. But more than that, he almost shattered my hope of ever seeing Harry again.” She removed her gloves. She had looked at these hands every day of her life; Harry had touched these hands. But now they were worn. “I told you I thought there was a message from Harry embedded in your photographs. But what I didn’t have a chance to tell you before—before our argument—was what that message was. It was a second code.”