13 Hangmen (17 page)

“How dare you!” Hagmann sputtered. “Angelo
wanted
me to have Number Thirteen out of thanks—because I was the only one who bothered to look after him once he fell ill. Not your grandfather Guido. Not your father.”

“Yeah, well, obviously you didn't do such a hot job,” Tony said. “So like I said, back off.” To avoid going off on the whole hangman thing, he stepped around the old man, stomped up the steps of his own front stoop, and began fumbling for his keys.

“Come back here,” Hagmann said. “I demand to know who has been filling your head with these lies.”

Tony slammed the door in his face.

ony was still shaking with rage when he entered the attic. He found Angelo sitting on the bed, teaching himself how to juggle with three of the four brass knobs he'd unscrewed from the bed frame.

“You look like you've just seen a ghost,” Angelo said.

“Very funny,” Tony said, taking a seat beside him.

“What the heck happened?” Angelo asked.

Tony explained how the back deck had collapsed; how he had had to help clean up the mess; how he'd ditched the twins at the hardware store and sneaked off to Ye Olde Curiosity Shoppe instead; how he'd learned from the Pickleses that the Hagmanns of Boston were actually dirty rotten ruthless hangmen from way
back; and how he'd then had a fight with Benedict Hagmann on the way up here.

“Jeepers, no wonder you've been gone so long,” Angelo said.

“I've only got a few minutes to talk,” Tony said. “Mom's going to tell the twins about Dad at dinner. I promised I'd totally have her back when she did. But I wanted to sneak up here first to hear what Solly's explosion was about.”

“Haven't seen him yet,” Angelo said. “He must still be back in his own era, outside this anomaly thingy. But I've got a pretty good idea—if what Mama just told me at supper is true.”

Before Angelo could elaborate, Solly himself burst into the room. “You are never going to believe what just happened,” he said. He motioned for Tony and Angelo to shove over on the bed.

“You're covered in soot,” Tony said.

“And you smell like cookies,” Angelo said.

“Molasses,” Solly said. “A gigantic tidal wave of oozing, sticky molasses, burbling down Atlantic Avenue, wrecking homes, lifting trolleys off their tracks, snapping telegraph wires, starting fires, injuring hundreds. Women screaming and crying, men rioting and fistfighting, kids pillaging and looting.”

“The Great Molasses Flood of 1919,” Angelo confirmed with a nod.

“Molasses?” Tony said. “From where?”

“That's exactly what I asked an Irish fireman sandbagging the entrance to Hangmen Court,” Solly said. “The fireman told me a holding tank at the Purity factory had exploded. No one knew why for sure, but it looked deliberate. The police had now barricaded off most of the Jewish quarter around the factory, he said. They weren't letting anyone in to save their homes or search for lost relatives while they investigated the crime scene. Meanwhile, members of the fire brigade were trying to keep the flood from spreading to the rest of the neighborhood—wherever they saw the Irish symbol of two hands clasping a heart—even though their own station had been flattened in the blast.”

“It becomes known as a claddagh,” Tony said. “I knew an Irish exchange student back in Ann Arbor who wore the same kind of ring.”

“Well, it's a good thing you put that claddagh knocker up on your door,” Angelo said to Solly, though he pronounced it more like
cladder
.

“Not just me,” Solly said. “Suddenly they were everywhere I turned: drawn with soap on windows, hanging on flags from doorways, chalked onto the sidewalk out in front of stoops. Which was why the fire brigade was sandbagging Hangmen Court first.”

“Sounds like claddaghs saved the day,” Angelo said.

“Then what happened?” Tony said.

“I started looking for Finn,” Solly said.

He wasn't at the pub. He wasn't at the deli on Hanover Street, though Mameh was safe. None of the shopkeepers in the neighborhood had seen him, nor any of the renters at his other buildings. Claddaghs everywhere, but no Finn. There was only one place left to look: Purity.

Solly sneaked past the police barricade and headed for the synagogue—the fastest way to get to the factory. Thank God the synagogue was still standing, though its roof was ablaze and men from the temple had formed a bucket brigade to douse the flames. Solly did a double take. Standing in line next to the rabbi was a soot-and-molasses-covered Finn McGinley. Solly called out to him. Finn looked over and grinned. “So you can still plant that tree today!” he shouted. Solly froze in terror. Coming up the street from the barricade was a furious-looking Frank Wallace with a half dozen goons from his gang. Coming down the street from the factory was Chester Hagmann, leading a half dozen cops toward the synagogue. “Run!” Solly shouted to Finn. When Finn saw why, he waved a sad goodbye and vanished into the crowd. Solly took Finn's place in the bucket brigade. They soon got the fire under control. But the tree-planting ceremony was definitely canceled. So was his bar mitzvah on Saturday.

“Wow, you really
did
have a terrible birthday,” Tony said.

“Do you guys think Finn blew up his own tank?” Solly said. “No molasses, no way for Frank Wallace to make illegal rum. No way for Chester Hagmann to blackmail Finn into selling Number Thirteen. No need for my family to start packing.”

“I've got some good news and bad news,” Angelo said.

“You know what happened to Finn?” Solly said.

Angelo nodded. “At supper, I asked Mama if she ever heard of a guy named Finn McGinley. Turns out he's sort of a North End legend.”

“So neither Wallace nor the cops nab him?” Solly said.

“That's the good news,” Angelo said. “Hagmann tried to blame him, of course. He reported to the police that Finn rented the holding tank from him, owned all that molasses, was desperate to get rid of it. But there was no way to prove it. All of Purity's accounting ledgers were destroyed in the flood. Needless to say, Frank Wallace denied knowing anything about the tank, or what the molasses might have been for. In the end, the police blamed the explosion on unseasonably warm weather: rapid expansion of the molasses inside the tank, too much stress on the rusty seams.”

“So all's well that ends well,” Tony said, slapping Solly's back.

“Not exactly,” Angelo said. “I haven't got to the bad news yet.”

The bedroom door flew open. The twins! Tony clutched the edge of the bed, terrified. How was he going to explain what Angelo and Solly were doing in his room?

“I can't believe you ditched us,” Mikey said. “Mom went mental about us not looking after you and sticking together and stuff.”

“Why are you sitting up here alone, talking to yourself?” Angey said.

“What's wrong?” Solly asked Tony.

“Look, the door's open,” Angelo said. “Maybe somebody came into Tony's room during his time.”

“I don't see anybody,” Solly said.

“Aren't you getting a little old for imaginary friends?” Mikey said to Tony. “Then again, they're probably the only ones you'll ever make.”

Angey didn't laugh. He checked behind the door.

Tony breathed a sigh of relief. Clearly, the twins couldn't see or hear Angelo or Solly any more than either thirteen-year-old from the past could see or hear the twins. “What makes you two think you can just barge in here whenever you like?” Tony said, pointedly.

Angelo informed Solly that Tony must be talking to his twin brothers.

“Dad's home,” Mikey said. “Dinner's in five minutes.”

I knew he was innocent!

“I wouldn't be grinning, if I were you,” Mikey said. “He didn't buy you a new bed. He gave up when Mom called him about the back deck. Can't afford it now. So it looks like you're stuck with this one.” With that he waltzed out.

Angey didn't follow him. Nor did he add his usual two cents. He just stared at Tony. Tony pretended to address him, but really he was tipping Angelo and Solly off about what was going on. “Dad's home? So what's for dinner?”

“There must be a break in the case,” Angelo said to Solly, “if the police have released Tony's dad from jail.” He told Tony to eat fast and report back. Meanwhile he'd give Solly the lowdown on Tony's afternoon. After he gave him the bad news, that is.

“Seriously,” Angey said. “Who
were
you talking to?”

“I got a cell phone for my birthday,” Tony said. “Duh.”

“But it's over there, on the dresser,” Angey said, pointing.

Crap!
Tony hopped off the bed, grabbed the phone, and made for the stairs. “Let's go,” he said. “I'm starving.”
Not.

“You really are as crazy as Mikey said,” Angey declared. But he peered one more time around the room before closing the door behind him.

It was a totally weird dinner.

Julia kept hugging Michael and squeezing his arm and
kissing his forehead. She served macaroni and cheese straight out of a box with packaged frozen peas—she
never
bought prepared food—while Michael and Tony made up stuff about the History Mystery Tour they hadn't actually taken. Portionwise, Tony had no problem refusing seconds; it was all he could do to choke down the first pasty, fist-size lump of macaroni stuck to his plate. Then, as Michael scooped frostbitten ice cream onto slices of leftover birthday cake, Julia gave him the update on the back-deck fiasco. The twins had gotten the names of several local contractors from the hardware store. She had called a guy named Eddie Wong, who would be stopping by tomorrow to give them an estimate for rebuilding it. Meantime, she and the twins had hung a temporary tarp over the holes in the back wall in case it rained. Tomorrow they would definitely need to finish sorting what was salvageable from what needed to be hauled to the dump. To everyone's surprise, Tony passed on dessert. Finally the twins headed upstairs to check emails on Michael's computer, insisting that Tony clear the table all by himself since he hadn't lifted a finger all day.

Tony leaped up and gave his dad a big hug. “They set you free!”

“That's the beauty of being innocent.” Michael grinned. “Thanks, by the way, for covering for me.”

“He was a total rock star,” Julia said.

“What finally convinced them?” Tony said.

Michael told Tony and Julia the whole story:

At about half past six, the two detectives had released him from the interrogation room with their apologies. They had just interviewed the coroner who had examined Zio Angelo's body. There wasn't a shred of evidence suggesting foul play. In fact, the coroner could cite only one minor irregularity—barely worth mentioning: that Zio Angelo had stopped taking his daily dose of heart medicine at some point. There wasn't a trace of it in his bloodstream at the hour of his death. Unfortunately, old people living on their own often forgot their meds, so even
that
wasn't all that unusual. As far as the detectives were concerned, the reason for Angelo's death remained natural causes. Which was a moot point, as it turned out, since the eyewitness who had insisted they undertake their investigation to begin with had just telephoned the station to drop all charges. Case closed.

“Wait, Old Man Hagmann dropped the charges?” Tony said. “What about all his allegations?”

“Don't tell me you've been talking to
him
again!” Michael said.

“He's not so easy to avoid,” Tony said. “He told me he caught you breaking into Zio Angelo's house the morning of his death.”

“I've had a key since high school,” Michael said, laughing.
“Whenever I visited him, I usually knocked. This time I just let myself in, since I knew that he'd moved most of his stuff into the parlor because it was hard for him to get up and down the stairs. But I didn't know he was completely bedridden. And I was utterly surprised when Mr. Hagmann came racing up from the kitchen, waving his own key. He explained how he'd been looking after Zio Angelo round the clock since he'd had another stroke the day before, and I actually remember feeling relieved that Zio Angelo had such a good friend living right next door.”