The Alienist - Caleb Carr [166]
“Poor John,” she said, giving me a warm hug. “Still trying to sort things out. Don’t worry—it’ll all be clear, someday. And you mustn’t fret too much about your priest theory being wrong. You’ll have another idea soon.”
With that she shoved me into the train, just as it began to grunt and wheeze out of the station.
Kreizler had engaged a first-class compartment, and after we’d settled into it I immediately stretched out on one seat with my face toward the small window, determined to strangle any curiosity I had about the behavior of my friends with sleep. For his part, Laszlo pulled out a copy of Wilkie Collins’s The Moonstone that Lucius Isaacson had lent him and began very contentedly reading. Further annoyed, I rolled over, pulled my cap down over my face, and began deliberately snoring even before I’d fallen asleep.
I was unconscious for over two hours, and woke to see rich, green New Jersey pastures shooting by the window. Stretching fully, I noted that my evil mood of the morning had at last departed: I was hungry, but otherwise quite pleased with life. A small note from Kreizler on the seat opposite me stated that he had gone to the dining car to secure a table for lunch, and I quickly neatened my appearance and made for that destination, ready to break bread with a vengeance.
The rest of our trip was first-rate. The farmlands of the Northeast are never more picturesque than in late May, and they formed a splendid backdrop for one of the better meals I’ve ever had on a train. Kreizler’s spirits were still quite high, and for once he proved willing to discuss subjects other than the case. We talked of the upcoming national political conventions (the Republicans were set to gather in St. Louis in June, and the Democrats would follow suit in Chicago later in the summer), and then about a piece in the Times that stated that there had been a riot in Harvard Square following a victory posted by our alma mater’s baseball team over Princeton. During dessert Kreizler nearly choked to death when he came across a report that Henry Abbey and Maurice Grau, managers of the Metropolitan Opera, had announced the failure of their company and debts of some $400,000. Laszlo’s composure was partially restored by the additional news that a group of “private backers” (undoubtedly headed by our host of the previous evening) were organizing to put the company back on a solid footing. The first step in this process was to be a high-priced benefit performance of Don Giovanni on June 21st. Kreizler and I determined that this was an event we must attend, no matter what state our investigation might be in at the time.
We arrived in Washington’s handsome Union Station late in the afternoon, and by dinnertime we were ensconced in a pair of very comfortable rooms at that imposing Victorian edifice on Pennsylvania Avenue and Fourteenth Street known as the Willard Hotel. All around us and quite visible from our fourth-story windows were the houses of our nation’s government. In a very few minutes I could have strolled over to the White House and asked Grover Cleveland how it would feel to relinquish that residence twice in one lifetime. I had not seen the capital since the simultaneous terminations of my career as a political reporter and my engagement to Julia Pratt; and it was only as I stood in my room at the Willard and stared at the beautiful panorama of Washington on a spring evening that I fully recognized how very far away from that former life I had grown. It was a melancholic sort of realization, and not to my liking; to counteract it, I quickly sought out a telephone and put in a call to Hobart Weaver, the old carousing partner of mine who was now a fairly high-level functionary at the Bureau of Indian Affairs. I found him still at his desk, and we made plans to meet that evening in the hotel dining room.
Kreizler joined us. Hobart was a portly, addle-brained, bespectacled fellow, who loved nothing more than free food and drink. By providing both commodities in abundance I was able to ensure that he would be not only discreet