And that one in the front, spit spewing from his mouth whenever he opened it. If he tried anything, he’d gut him. Slit their bellies like pigs’ carcasses, expose their organs while they still breathed. Only a matter of time till nightfall. Catch the train, packed already, leave behind what can’t be carried. Always another, that softness between his fingers. Never again would he allow one to strike him back. Take them to a dark place, hold them in your hands. The silence. The way they never blinked.

Chapter 80

Chapter 80

THEY GRABBED HIM in front of the fortune-telling booth. Two men, one wearing a shapeless dark suit and derby, the other in uniform.

“Excuse me, what are you doing?” Lionel asked as they drew up alongside him.

“Shut up.”

The policeman smacked his billy club against Lionel’s ribs. He doubled over as the two men took his arms and bullied their way through the crowd.

They dragged him to the park station house, down a hallway and into an office where a barrel-chested man stood behind a desk, a police captain by the look of him.

But not a real policeman, Lionel thought, his desperation growing, surely he wouldn’t have the authority to make an arrest. Someone must have seen him in Fairyland yesterday—that man, the one who resembled a banker. He could have been a plant, put there to entrap inverts. Yet Lionel had done nothing!

But he could still go to prison—he would be ruined, even murdered.

No, he would not, he thought. Think of it as a story, how would the hero escape? He drew a few deep breaths, focused on the details of the room around him. The smells of sweat that clung to the men’s woolen uniforms and stale cigar smoke. The light scent of his own Lilac Vegetal cologne—they’d find a way to use that against him. Scattered newspapers. The carnival clamor from outside the open windows, air heavy as wet fleece.

“We found him, Captain Hickey.” The man in the suit glanced in disgust at Lionel. “I spotted him by the booth and signaled Mr. Doylan.”

“Looks like he put up a fight.” Captain Hickey turned to Lionel. “What is your name, sir?”

Lionel stared the captain full in the face. “I didn’t fight.”

“I asked your name.”

Hickey’s eyes narrowed. He gestured at the two men, who released Lionel. For the first time, Lionel saw that the plainclothesman held his straw boater, now crushed flat. He set it on the desk in front of Hickey with a flourish.

The captain pushed the hat aside irritably. “If you please, sir. Your name.”

“Lionel Gerring.”

“Mr. Gerring, what is your employment?”

“I work at the Essanay motion-picture studio. I’m a scenarist—a writer. I write photoplays.”

“A writer.” Hickey shuffled through the scattered newspapers until he found a small object. “Would this be yours?” He held up a notebook.