Page 27 of By Any Means

Laurie blew out a breath. “Yeah, I was following you,” he said lightly but very low. “And who did I find going into Wright glassworks but their owner, covered in yak hair? Then to find you rooming in the seventeenth ward? Working at your own factory? Of course I followed you. C’mon, we should go. Back to your 2nd Street… house.”

Chary, emboldened and uncaring, facing more immediate danger from the man in front of him than any street mob, refused. “Why should I?”

Laurie sighed. “I’ve got stuff to tell you. Lives are at stake. Possibly your own. Possibly more. Goddammit, I didn’t want to do this on the street.”

“No. Why should I believe you, Laurie Moore? You haven’t ceased lying from the moment we shook hands.”

“Oh, from well before then,” Laurie agreed. “Some days, it’s part of the job. But you know all about that, don’t you? Lying for your job?”

Oh, Lord. How much did he know? If he knew where Chary had been and what he’d been doing, he’d know other things. Did he know about August? Oh, Lord. He could out them all in a second, and then more investigators would follow. He could lose everything.

Laurie took hold of his arm. He wasn’t just strong but looked it too: his upper half was thickly built, like he perpetually belonged in a knit sweater. Actually, everything was thickly built. Football came to mind again. Rugby. Laurie was a fan of baseball, wasn’t he? Or had that been a lie?

“Look, Chary, I’m serious. Men have died, and I don’t want to get arrested on the fucking Bowery for solicitation. Come on.”

Chary stared as he let himself be—surprisingly gently—pulled along. “What? Died? Who?”

“Your brother, to start with,” Laurie said over his shoulder. “But others since, too.”

Others? “But surely, they have nothing to do with August or myself.”

Laurie grunted. “I can’t say it doesn’t. August’s the beginning of it all, isn’t he? I want answers. I’m going to get them one way or another, and it looks like I have to start with you.”

Chary was going to be sick. “My brother wasn’t killed. He—” He gave up. Laurie clearly hadn’t listened the first time. “I believe I already told you. He wasn’t murdered. His death was accidental. And completely unexpected. Who are you, really? Please tell me. Are you a Pinkerton? Police? A detective? From the vice societies? Tammany Hall?”

“No,” Laurie said, with faint disgust. “I’m a journalist; that’s all.”

“That’s all!” A reporter. It was almost worse than any other thing. Was this the beginning of the end for him?

His alarm showed. Laurie looked back once more, and his expression softened. “I’ll explain. Honest to God, I just want to talk.”

“I don’t seem to have much choice, do I?”

Laurie smiled thinly. “You’re really not what I expected, Cherry.”

8

LAURIE

A little bit slower on Laurie’s part—a little bit tighter choice of suit—and Laurie would’ve lost Chary Wright to the coal-dusted broadness of the Bowery crowd. Taken at a glance, the man was rail thin, spindly and awkward. But he’d rabbited off sudden, like the wiry-muscled Olympic sprinter he’d seen at last year’s World’s Fair.

Explosive. That was the word for it. Laurie could work with that.

Never mind that working with that was possibly dangerous, especially with what he knew now. Laurie had a story now, concrete connection between four dead gaffers and a dead glass heir, a lead.

Back to the rooming house they went—on sidewalks this time—with Chary leading. Laurie watched the man’s loping gait, wondering if he’d run again, and if so, if Laurie would let him go.

He wouldn’t. At least five men connected to the glassworks were dead, if he included August Wright. Chary could be behind it all.

They weren’t followed off Bowery. But they’d gotten through the walkup of the rooming house and were three stories high and upon the stair landing before Laurie could breathe properly. He felt watched.

“Your key?” he demanded. “How does your landlady feel about visitors?”

Chary fished in his jeans. “I wouldn’t know. She’s Ukrainian.”

And the trains probably drowned out most things regardless. Laurie plucked the key from his hand and walked to the door. He could feel the taller man above him, breath falling on the strict part of his hair, hot and fast.

There came steps upon the not-so-distant stair behind them, unhurried but swift. Chary made an acute, distressed noise and pressed against him, knees, toes and elbows, long fingers in Laurie’s softer bits of shoulder; Laurie nearly yelped.