The Six Messiahs - Mark Frost [68]
By dawn of the following day, a more practical consequence, the manhunt to track down this murdering Chinaman, was already under way.
NEW YORK CITY
Dazzling electric light displays lit up the span of the boulevard and revealed a street carnival of humanity crowding around the theaters and groggeries and dime museums and particularly outside the town's newest sensation, the five-cent Kinetoscope parlors lining either side of Broadway. Roving vendors hawked a warehouse of cheap movable goods—toys, shoes, scissors, suspenders, pots, and pans. Knife grinders threw sparks off their whetstones; ragpickers jangled the bells on their carts. Promenaders dined on baked apples, hot cross buns, steamed clams for sale out on the street. Winsome young girls offered cobs of hot corn—an attraction Innes did not fail to pick out of the mix. Some blew bugles to sound their wares, others wore block-printed sandwich boards, most depended on their voices; sharp, repetitive choruses cutting through the din.
Electric streetcar operators leaned on their horns and carved a path through the dense carriage traffic, edging jittery horses still not accustomed to their presence out of the way. Double-decked omnibuses trundled tourists looking for a thrill around the tangled midtown streets; every few yards of fitful progress brought a fresh sensation into view. Bohemians in berets and garish neckerchiefs. Gamblers and grifters sniffing out their next big play. Local toughs footpadding in striped sweaters and floppy gang hats. Preening swells in plaid suits, pearl-gray derbies, and matching spats taking the air with a dolly on each arm. Streetwalkers between jobs stumbling off their gin or hop. Irish cops patrolling a beat, bouncing their sticks off the sidewalk. A Salvation Army band pounding drums, fishing for recruitable strays. Pimps, rummies, newspaper boys, jugglers, runaways, Chinese cigar sellers.
"Can you imagine, Arthur?" said Innes. "Ten o'clock at night and the streets this full of life? By Jove, have you ever seen the like!"
Doyle watched Innes eyeing the parade, feeling a protective swell of affection for his brother's exuberance and untested innocence. Was there a danger he'd corrupt those qualities by leading him further down this path he'd begun to follow? He'd never mentioned a word to Innes about Jack Sparks or what they'd been through together, not even since Jack reappeared on the ship. Was it right to expose Innes to the sort of danger Jack courted as a matter of routine? Given his responsibilities to wife and family and his professional obligations, Doyle questioned whether he had any business putting himself in harm's way, either.
Sparks sat in the driver's perch above them, anonymous, cold. Doyle studied his face as he picked their way through traffic; he had harbored serious reservations about Jack's state of mind ten years ago: his obsessions, dark mood swings, his closeted appetite for drugs. He could only guess at what horrors the man had lived through since; he might have become perfectly deranged by now. Could he be trusted?
"This can't be the most direct way to the hotel, can it, Arthur?" said Innes, not minding at all.
It was not too late to fling open the door, spirit Innes away from Jack Sparks and everything he represented. Doyle saw the image of his wife's hands, folded peacefully in her lap. Irrationally, another woman's face drifted into his mind: the actress, Eileen Temple. The lights of these Broadway theaters must have summoned her up. He knew she had come to this city, leaving him flat at the end of their brief romance, to follow her career and seek her fortune. Her black Irish beauty; their fleeting time together had haunted him ever since. We want most what we can never have, thought Doyle. Could she be out here tonight, nearby,