A Song Across the Sea (23 page)

With a vicious sweep of his arm, he ripped open her dress, along with the flimsy undergarment beneath it. She felt the nubby texture of his suit coat press against the exposed flesh of her breasts. Trying to push his bulk off her was impossible. She reached her arms around him and pounded fiercely on his back with her fists.

He slapped her hard with his open hand then squeezed her breasts before moving his groping, rough-textured fingers further downward. His lips were on hers again. How she hated the taste of him! She bit hard on his lip—drawing blood—and was rewarded with another slap that jarred her so hard her face ached. There was no lust in the convulsive way he moved against her. No desire. Only anger. He was intent on punishing her. His muscled body was full of fury. She felt something hard pressing against her and knew, in despair, that he was going to win.

He reached down with one hand to fumble with his belt buckle, giving her the opening she needed. She swung her arm as hard as she could and gave him a solid clout to the side of his head and at the same time, brought her knee up hard between his legs.

She was scarcely aware of his surprised grunt of pain. She rolled away from him and staggered to her feet, nearly falling to the ground in her haste to escape from the alley. She was badly shaken. Her wobbly legs threatened to collapse before she reached the street. She looked over the shoulder and saw him get shakily to his feet, although he was bent over in pain. He made a feeble effort to follow her just as she broke free from the shadowy confines of the alleyway.

“You’ve made a bad mistake!” His enraged shout followed her.

She dashed toward the streetcar that was just pulling away from the curb and scrambled aboard, heedless of the curious stares of the other passengers. She felt streaks of dirt and tears on her face. Her cheek still burned from his slap; it must show a mottled red blotch. With shaking fingers she tried to straighten her hair, which hung in a dirty, disheveled tangle down her back. She clutched her ripped clothing to her, trembling violently and trying to forget his parting words. “You’ll pay for this,” he’d said. “By God, you’ll pay!”

•  •  •

The shame she felt couldn’t be washed away with the water from the porcelain basin she’d dipped her washcloth into again and again after arriving safely home. She’d removed the layers of alley grime from her face and ran the cloth over the now-tender contours of her body, remembering his fingers closing possessively over her breasts.

Why hadn’t she had the courage to go to the police? Because she didn’t want Reece to hear of it? Didn’t want him to wonder why she hadn’t told him and Miriam the truth about Muldoon straightaway?

It was her own fault, partly, for allowing Muldoon to give Reece and Miriam the wrong impression. What a stupid, foolish girl she’d been! She should have kept her distance from the man. He was far more dangerous than she’d realized. She’d underestimated him and had been brutally attacked as a consequence. How could she have thought that he’d be easily sent packing—as he’d been in Ireland? He was like some primitive animal, who, once freed of the natural habitat that had kept him a reasonable size, grew large in appetite and ferocity. This New World, this New York City, was a bountiful feast for someone like Muldoon. It had plentiful opportunities for all, including—unfortunately—criminals.

Her sleep was fitful, broken by fragments of disturbing dreams. Paddy came back to visit her, his face woeful. When he opened his mouth to speak, she heard her own voice, singing a tune to Molly. Reece flew overhead, guiding his silvery monoplane through a jagged reach of chalky clouds that turned into gleaming icebergs. “I love him,” she heard herself say. His airplane suddenly sputtered, stalled and plunged downward. It crashed onto the largest iceberg and splintered into ostrich feathers, like those she’d seen on women’s hats. Reece’s blood-soaked body lay among the feathers on a flat, slippery plane of the monstrous iceberg which bobbed in the ocean like a cork, carrying Reece farther and farther away from her.

Tara sat up in bed, her heart thudding erratically in her chest. She pulled her chair up to the window and gazed out at the leaden dawn that settled over the city like a shroud.

•  •  •

Tara was less than a half-block from the theater when she detected an acrid, biting odor in the air. Strange that a crowd was gathered outside of the theater, she thought. It was much too early for people to be lining up for a show, and besides, this was no orderly ticket queue. She hurried the last few yards to the theater.

Mr. Glass stood on the sidewalk, conferring with several well-dressed businessmen that she guessed might be the theater’s owners. She’d never met them. Mr. Glass was the nominal “boss” of the enterprise, but she knew the financial reins were held by others.

A horse-drawn steamer pump engine pulled away just as she approached, the uniformed firemen on board looking exhausted and bedraggled. With increasing horror, Tara beheld the building that housed her beloved theater. Its gilded, ornate facade was reduced to a charred skeleton of black bones and a yawning ruin of cavities. The box office booth adjoining the front of the building was completely gone; the glass windows that had enclosed it lay in spiny shards on the street amid scattered bricks and smokestained lengths of timber. The now-exposed-lobby looked desolate. Once-handsome wallpaper embossed with velvet scrolls and plumes curled away from the walls in pathetic strips. She saw a melted, milky blob clinging to a sodden section of wall above scorched oak paneling and realized with a start that it was one of the graceful frosted-glass wall sconces whose glowing orbs of light she’d always viewed with such pleasure. The ground was littered with burnt debris, still smoldering here and there in spite of the soaking it had obviously gotten from the firemen. The odor of damp, seared wood was nauseating.

Tara threaded her way through the gaggle of onlookers, trying to quell the feeling of dread rising inside her. What of the house, the stage, the backstage area, the dressing rooms? Was it
all
destroyed?

Unmindful of the danger, she moved purposefully toward the ravaged shell of the lobby.

“Tara!” Mr. Glass waved to her. He detached himself from the men he’d been talking to and made his way over to her. “You can’t go in there. It’s not safe.”

“How bad is it?”

“Bad enough. This here’s the worst, but the main part of the building is ok. The last few rows of seats in the upper balcony’ll have to be replaced. We’ll never get the smell of smoke outta them.”

“This is just awful!”

“You’re tellin’ me, kid. We’ll be closed for three, maybe four weeks while we make repairs.”

“That long?” She was aghast. Three weeks with no pay coming in! It was a tremendous financial blow. She only had a little money saved, and with the extra expense of caring for Sheila, it wouldn’t last long.

She finally found her voice. “How… How did it happen?”

Mr. Glass was watching her closely. “I was hoping you could tell me.”

“What d’ya mean, Mr. Glass? I don’t understand.”

“It’s this way, kid. Last night I get a telephone call tellin’ me to drop you from the show. If I don’t, I’ll be sorry. The guy got pretty nasty, as a matter of fact, but I laughed it off, figuring it’s some crazy who thinks he’s in love with you or something. Then this morning…” He waved his hands toward the theater. “This morning, I knew it was no joke.”

She still couldn’t comprehend it. “Someone did this…on purpose?”

Mr. Glass shoved his hands in his pockets and looked grim. “The oldest trick in the book. A bottle filled with gasoline, plugged up with a rag that was lit on fire. They threw it right through the box office window. You got any enemies, Tara? Any ideas about who coulda done this?”

Of course she did. She knew precisely who was behind this devastation. The only surprising thing was how quickly Muldoon had made good on his threat.

•  •  •

With Mr. Glass a reassuring bulk by her side, she dutifully made her report at the police station. Two officers were sent to bring Muldoon in for questioning, and she had a truly awful moment when he was brought before her. She nodded silently when asked to identify him. Muldoon was calm and infuriatingly courteous when answering the questions put to him. He was conveniently accompanied by his attorney and another man, both of whom swore he’d been playing poker with them most of the previous night.

“Sure and I saw this young lady last night. Backstage, to compliment her on her performance. Surely there’s nothing wrong with that? She has a lovely singing voice, she does. I thought performers were happy to hear compliments.”

Detective George Bryan, a balding hulk of a man with a bulbous, once-broken nose and shrewd, intelligent eyes, revealed no speck of emotion.

“The lady says you attacked her in the alley afterwards.”

Muldoon was unrattled. “And why did she wait until now to say anything? If such a thing had happened, wouldn’t any decent woman run straight to the police?”

Even Mr. Glass gave her a sidelong glance at this statement. Damn Muldoon! But he wasn’t finished yet.

“Ah, you know how it is with women. Some of them are prone to hysterical imaginings. I think this one thought there was more between us than there was. When I put her off, she dreamed up this story.”

“What about the bruises on her face? They’re not imaginary.”

Muldoon shrugged, unconcerned. “Perhaps she took a tumble. Maybe she likes her boyfriend to play rough with her. There were two other people in the dressing room during my visit. Why don’t you talk to them? They can tell you that Miss McLaughlin and I were on friendly terms.” He pretended to search his memory for the names. “Miriam Sedgewell and Reece Waldron. A very respectable couple, they looked to be. Why don’t you go and bring them in to the station house, here. Be interesting to hear what they have to say, wouldn’t it, now?”

“No!” she blurted out. “Please don’t involve them!” The prospect was mortifying. Reece finding out about this whole wretched mess was more than she could bear.

Detective Bryan, however, wasn’t really listening to her. He looked suddenly alert.

“Miriam Sedgewell? Daughter of Arthur Sedgewell?”

“D’ya know the lady?” Muldoon asked amiably.

Bryan grunted. “Not likely. But I’ve seen her picture in the society pages often enough.”

Muldoon pressed his advantage home. “I should think she’d make a fine witness, then.”

The man was infuriating! He wasn’t content with setting fire to the theater and endangering Tara’s very livelihood. He wanted to humiliate her as well. She struggled to her feet.

“Miss Sedgewell and Mr. Waldron know nothin’ of the events that took place after they left. It would be useless to talk to them. And,” she said pointedly, “They would hardly appreciate being dragged into a criminal affair like this.”

Bryan looked thoughtful.

“You’re free to go, Mr. Muldoon. We may have some questions for you later.”

He tipped his hat jauntily. “Always glad to do my civic duty, so to speak.”

Tara watched in disbelief as he strode confidently from the room, followed by his attorney and his so-called fellow poker player. Dazed, she caught snatches of conversation between Mr. Glass and Detective Bryan. Muldoon had an alibi. There was no evidence connecting him to the fire. It was her word against his.

Mr. Glass sighed heavily. “I’m sorry, kid. We tried.”

Her eyes blazed at Bryan, twin dark-blue furies. “You’re just going to let him walk out the door? He’s free? Oh, it’s a fine way you have of doin’ your job, detective.”

Bryan didn’t react. “I tend to agree with you, Miss McLaughlin, that Muldoon is behind this, but without evidence, there’s nothing we can do. You didn’t help your case any by failing to report his attack last night right after it happened. We could have rounded him up at the time, perhaps even prevented the fire at the theater from happening. Although,” he muttered under his breath, “Muldoon has plenty of lackeys to carry out his orders, when he’s too busy to do the dirty work himself.”

Bryan
did
believe her. Surely that meant he would find a way to bring Muldoon to justice, didn’t it?

As if reading her thoughts, Muldoon shook his head in frustration. “We’ve had our eye on him for some time, but we’ve never been able to catch him at anything. Beatings, mysterious fires, rumors of business owners having to pay him “protection money” or ending up with broken bones. God only knows how many thugs he’s got working for him. He’s a dangerous man, Miss McLaughlin. How did you ever happen to make his acquaintance?”

She gave him a brief account of her unpleasant encounter with Muldoon, back in Ireland. “Meetin’ up with him again in America was the last thing I imagined happenin’, Detective Bryan. In a country this large…” She shrugged helplessly.

“I’m not all that surprised. So many Irish come and settle in New York,” he commented. “My own parents among them. New York may be a big city, but in some ways, it’s a small world. He’s a dangerous man, Miss McLaughlin. A man to steer clear of. You’re lucky that something worse didn’t happen.”

She didn’t feel lucky outside of the police station a few minutes later, when Mr. Glass told her that her services were no longer needed at the theater, even when it was repaired.

“Jeez, Tara, you know I don’t want to do this. But the owners were adamant. Maybe if this Muldoon had ended up in jail, I coulda changed their minds. But with him walking around a free man, it’s just too dangerous. He could burn us down to the ground next time. Maybe kill some people in the process.”

She didn’t take any comfort from the miserable expression on his face. He fumbled in his pockets and came up with some wrinkled bills.

“Here, take this. It’s the pay you got coming to you. Maybe it’ll tide you over until you find more work.”

She accepted the money mechanically, thanked him and started to turn away.

“Tara? I’ve been in this business for a lotta years, kid, and for what it’s worth, you’re one of the best I’ve ever seen. What a voice you got! You can hold your own on any stage.”