Death Casts a Spell, Chapter 12

Now that Pearl was awake, there was nothing that would keep her from welcoming two new guests to her home. She pushed her bedsheets aside, came over to me, and wrapped me in a hearty, engulfing hug. “You’re my family,” she said.

“No, Pearl,” said Jeannette. “Just a friend.”

“She says that to everyone she likes,” said Freddie.

Read from the beginning:

Death Casts a Spell

Pearl looked Mr. Gallo over, but he did not get welcomed into the family. She did, however, permit him a small, shy smile, which he returned as gently as he knew how. Mr. Gallo’s version of a smile was usually more of a cynical smirk, but I could tell he was trying hard to not look threatening. Judging from Pearl’s reaction, the result was not an enormous success.

“All right, Pearl, settle down,” Freddie said, as Pearl enveloped me in another hug. “I’ll make them coffee if you lie down. Won’t that be nice?”

I had begun to notice a slightly labored quality to Pearl’s breathing, and as soon as she released me from her arms, I sat down on the bed and patted the space beside me. Pearl sat down, and I saw some of the tension ease from Freddie’s shoulders.

Freddie made coffee, and Jeannette and Mr. Gallo moved the apartment’s one small table near Pearl’s bed so we could all sit and talk together. I was dying to hear their family history, and I wasn’t disappointed. It was Jeannette who started the story. “Sixteen years ago, Jeannette Jacoby was born. The real Jeannette Jacoby.”

Pearl tapped me on the shoulder. “Hey, guess what? That was me!” Her wide eyes invited me to share her amazement.

“That’s right, Pearl, that was you.” Jeannette bent a fond smile on the other girl. She went on. “It took a day or two for anyone to notice her condition. And by then, the Jacobys had already sent out their announcements about a bouncing baby girl. They didn’t want to admit that their perfect family might not be everything they’d made it out to be.”

Freddie took up the tale. “My ma worked for Mr. Jacoby, downtown at his office. Not a secretary, just a cleaning lady. She worked for him until she was almost ready to have us.” She gestured to Jeannette. “Well, we’re born, see. She’s at home with us. And one day, Mr. Jacoby shows up on the front porch. He’s got a bunch of money, and he’s got this baby.” She gestured to Pearl.

“At first, Ma thought he wanted to pay her just to take Pearl. But then she realized that he wanted something in return. He wanted one of us.”

She told the story simply, yet my heart flipped over at the thought of what the twins’ mother must have gone through. Handing her baby over to another family, knowing she would never see her again. How could she have done it?

And yet I knew exactly how. Money. She hadn’t wanted to raise her children in poverty, and I couldn’t blame her. Freddie confirmed my thoughts with her next words.

“So Ma is all ready to say no way, but then she starts thinking about the life Jeannie could have. She’d have everything money could buy—fancy dresses, fancy schools, the works. She thinks if she really loves us, she’ll let one of us go live that life.”

Jeannette returned to the narrative. “Except it wasn’t like that at all,” she said. “Mother—Mrs. Jacoby—sometimes she tried to be a mother. Sometimes she’d take me to the park, or out for ice cream. But then I’d always catch her looking at me, with this strange, wounded expression on her face. As though she thought being with me was some sort of punishment. As if she’d give anything to send me back.”

She shrugged. “Of course, I didn’t know there was anywhere to go back to, at that point. I just knew she didn’t want me.”

I looked around the apartment. There was one question eating at me. “What happened to the money, Freddie?” I didn’t know how large the sum had been, but plainly, nothing of it remained.

Freddie frowned, and seemed to struggle with herself for a moment. She had let us into her difficulties with Vetrovsky, and into her home. But plainly, there was something she still wasn’t ready to share with us.

Jeannette placed her hand over Freddie’s and spoke for her. “Pearl had heart problems,” she said. “Right from the start.”

Freddie gave a deep sigh and took over. “Ma did everything to keep her healthy. She loved Pearl.” She reached out and stroked Pearl’s hair, and the other girl gave a wet sniff. “But the money ran out. There was always some new medicine she needed, some new treatment. One time, Ma goes to ask Mr. Jacoby for help. She figures he’d be glad to pay for it. Pearl is his daughter, after all. But he says if Ma ever shows up at his office again, he’ll have her arrested. She says for what, and he says—get this—kidnapping!”

I blinked at the pure outrage of this. It was a story Mr. Jacoby could not possibly have taken to the police—not without exposing the secret at the heart of his prominent family. But if Freddie’s mother had believed the threat, it might have cowed her. Even if she hadn’t believed him, the threat itself was a clear declaration of absolute indifference to the wellbeing of Freddie’s family. With two children to care for, she might have decided it was better not to cross someone so powerful and unprincipled.

Freddie lapsed into an angry silence, and Jeannette gave me the last part of their story. “Here’s the problem,” she said. “Pearl’s medicine isn’t working anymore. She needs an operation. We almost have the whole down payment together, but we need an adult—someone in the family—to sign off on it. Otherwise the hospital won’t do it.”

“And Ma’s dead,” said Freddie. “So tell me where I’m going to get a new mother.”

Pearl threw her arms around me again. “You’re my family,” she whispered in my ear.

Freddie looked at Jeannette. Jeannette looked at me. “You could do it,” she said.

“Me?” I turned from one of the twins to the other. “Just how old do you think I look?”

Freddie shrugged off that point. “All you have to do is come down to the hospital and sign a form. It’ll take two minutes. We have an appointment already, on Wednesday. Nine sharp. Meet us there?”

I looked at Mr. Gallo in appeal. He looked back at me thoughtfully. “It might work,” he said at last.

I leveled a finger at him. “And just how old do you think I look?”

“You don’t have to be their mother,” he said. “Be their aunt. Do it for Pearl.”

He looked over at Pearl, who was presently draped across my shoulders giving me yet another hug. This time, when his lips curved up, the smile he gave her was truly gentle. I gaped at Pearl. In a very short time, she’d managed to get underneath that granite exterior of his. I’d have to ask her for lessons.

“Fine,” I said. “I’ll be an aunt. But in exchange, I want your word that you’re done with Vetrovsky. Whatever he’s planning with Arthur Burrage, you don’t have to be a part of it. Walk away.”

The twins’ faces closed down. “You don’t understand,” said Freddie. “He—won’t like that.”

I looked her dead in the eye, remembering the way both girls had shrunk back from Vetrovsky when he reached for his pocket. “And what exactly does he do when he doesn’t like something? Does he hurt you?”

“No,” Jeannette said. “It doesn’t hurt, but—” She looked away from me.

I exchanged glances with Mr. Gallo, then put on the sternest voice I could manage. “If you want my help, one of you is going to have to be straight with us,” I said. “What does Vetrovsky do?”

Jeannette took a deep breath. “He calls it his little doctor,” she said. “It’s a drug.” She grimaced. “He injects it, with a needle.” She mimed this, aiming an imaginary needle at her sister’s neck. “And then…you’re helpless. You can’t move.”

I stared at her. “And what does he do while you’re helpless?” I asked, horrified.

Jeannette stared back at me, then blushed when she realized what I was implying. “No. It’s nothing like that. But it’s awful, awful—it feels like you’re screaming on the inside, but no one can hear you.”

Pearl hid her face against my shoulder. I put my arms around her, feeling awful for her distress, but needing to ask one more question. “But why do you let him do it?” I asked.

“Because we need the money he pays us.” Jeannette’s eyes lingered on her twin. “And if I don’t let him do it to me, he’ll do it to Freddie.”

I felt ill. Mr. Gallo had been right—Vetrovsky had several tools he used to keep the girls in line. Money, his strange paralytic, and perhaps most dangerously, their love for one another.

I shrugged. “Well, what’s your plan?” I asked. “Keep doing what he wants?” I gave Jeannette my sternest possible look. “Has it occurred to you that this deception of his is unbelievably cruel?”

The twins squirmed. I’d been gentle in my language, placing the blame for Arthur’s manipulation solely on Vetrovsky. But they couldn’t miss the implications. Whatever Vetrovsky was doing to Arthur, he was doing it with their assistance.

I took advantage of their discomfort to press for more facts. “What is this game, anyway?” I said. “What does he want from Arthur? And who exactly is Alice?”

It was Jeannette who answered me. “Alice is—she was—Arthur’s daughter.” Her eyes flicked to mine and then quickly slid away. “She died a few years ago. Arthur has been trying to contact her.”

“Contact her.” I repeated the words and let them hang accusingly in the air. The girls knew full well that the play they had enacted with Vetrovsky was no wistful drama about a bereaved parent reaching out to his lost child. It had been a farce that bordered on the demonic. “It sounds to me like he’s trying to rescue her.”

Jeannette looked helplessly at her twin. Freddie took up the role of group spokeswoman. “It didn’t start out that way,” she said. “It used to be just lovey dovey stuff. I miss you, Daddy. That sort of thing.”

“What changed?” asked Mr. Gallo.

The twins exchanged another glance. “We’re not sure,” Jeannette admitted. “One day Vetrovsky came in with a new script, and it was—” She hesitated.

“Awful,” Freddie interjected. “Really scary and—well, you saw what it’s like.”

I had indeed. I looked from Freddie to Jeannette, who whispered. “It’s getting worse. Every time.”

“So call it off,” I said. “Walk away from Vetrovsky. Mr. Gallo will make it clear to him that he’s not to bother you.”

Both girls glanced at my boss, who gave them a nod so grave and gallant it might have come from a knight of the round table. But then Freddie shook her head. “We know it’s not right,” she said. She straightened her spine and forced herself to look me dead in the eye. “But we need more money. For Pearl. We need a little more time.”

I frowned. I considered the possibility of marching myself straight down to Arthur’s office and inviting him to take a tour of the Majestic’s attic with me. That would put a stop to Vetrovsky’s theatrics.

But there was a part of me that, like the girls, wanted more time. I wanted to understand what Vetrovsky was up to. More than that, I wanted to know if I could undo some of the damage he’d done to Arthur—if I could leave that poor old man with some of the peace that he’d been seeking. This case had landed me in the lap of three broken families—Eleanor’s, Freddie’s, and Arthur’s. I couldn’t help wanting to pick up the pieces of at least one of them.

I glanced past the girls, to where Mr. Gallo was sitting, and caught his eye. Thoughts flashed unspoken between us. For now, we’d allow the girls the time they wanted. But we’d use it to try and get at the truth.