The Alienist - Caleb Carr [101]
On the morning in question, Sara and I—just coming into Number 808 Broadway as Kreizler went out—happened to be watching as Laszlo tried to enter his calash and very nearly fainted. He shook the spell off with ammonia salts and a laugh, but Cyrus told us that this time it had been two days since he’d had anything like real sleep.
“He’ll kill himself if he doesn’t slow down,” Sara said, as the calash rolled off and we got into the elevator. “He’s trying to make up for the lack of clues and facts with effort. As if he can force an answer to this thing.”
“He’s always been that way,” I replied, shaking my head. “Even when we were boys, he was always at something, and always so deadly serious. It was somewhat amusing, in those days.”
“Well, he’s not a child now, and he ought to learn to take care of himself.” That was Sara’s tough side talking; it was a different tone that came through when she asked, with what seemed affected casualness and without looking at me, “Have there never been any women in his life, John?”
“There was his sister,” I answered, knowing that it wasn’t what she was driving at. “They used to be very close, but she’s married now. To an Englishman, a baronet or some such.”
With what I thought was effort, Sara remained dispassionate. “But no women—romantically, I mean?”
“Oh. Yes, well, there was Frances Blake. He met her at Harvard and for a couple of years it looked as though they might get married. I never saw it, myself—for my money she was something of a shrew. He seemed to find her charming, though.”
Sara’s most mischievous smile, that tiny curl of her upper lip, appeared. “Perhaps she reminded him of someone.”
“She reminded me of a shrew. Look, Sara, what do you mean when you say Kreizler seems as though he’s got some personal stake in this thing? Personal how?”
“I’m not quite sure, John,” she answered, as we walked into our headquarters and found the Isaacsons engaged in a vehement squabble over some evidential details. “But I can say this—” Sara lowered her voice, indicating that she didn’t wish to pursue the conversation in front of any of the others. “It’s more than just his reputation, and more than just scientific curiosity. It’s something old and deep. He’s a very deep man, your friend Dr. Kreizler.”
With that Sara drifted off to the kitchen to make herself some tea, and I was dragged into the Isaacsons’ argument.
Thus did we pass most of April, with the weather warming up, small pieces of information slowly but steadily falling into place, and questions about each other opening wider without being openly addressed. There would be time to explore such matters later, I kept telling myself—for now the work was what mattered, the job at hand, on which depended who knew how many lives. Focus was the key—focus and preparation, readiness to meet whatever could be hatched from the mind of the man we sought. I took this attitude confidently, feeling, after viewing two of his victims, that I’d seen the worst he had to offer.
But an incident that occurred at the end of the month presented