Fallen Women (25 page)

“No, I would know what happened.”

Beret and the judge exchanged glances. He had gone to his wife, and now he pried her hand from the door frame and led her to his chair, then poured brandy into a glass and handed it to her. But Varina set down the glass without drinking. When William came to the door, Beret asked him to bring another cup and saucer. “And hurry,” she added.

“How long were you standing there?” Judge Stanton asked.

“Only a moment, long enough to hear Mick say that Jonas murdered Lillie and another girl and tried to kill a third. It is horrible, John, horrible. He murdered our dear niece, and I myself brought him into this house. It’s my fault.” She put her hands over her face and cried, the judge sitting on one arm of the chair, Beret on the other, both comforting her.

“It was not your fault at all. You did a good deed, taking in a poor boy like that,” the judge said. “He was a fine and loyal employee. How could you have known he had a black heart?”

William, dressed now, poured coffee into a cup then handed it to Beret, who told her aunt to drink. Varina seemed grateful and took several sips, before her hand began to shake. Beret took away the cup and handed it back to William.

“And it was you who apprehended him, Michael?” Varina asked.

“Yes. I shot him. Jonas is dead,” Mick said.

“Jonas?” William broke in. He had been setting the half-filled cup on the tray and spilled the coffee. The butler’s face was white, and he had lost a little of his composure.

“Jonas murdered my sister,” Beret said, wishing she had thought to ask the butler about the groom when she questioned him. She would talk to him later, when her aunt and uncle weren’t around. It seemed as if he knew something.

“Oh, madam, I am sorry.” His face was turned to Varina, but his eyes sought Beret’s.

Varina roused herself to say, “Don’t tell the other servants, William. We don’t want to alarm them. The judge will speak to them later.” And then she added, “And don’t talk to any newspaper people. We do not want this to reflect on Judge Stanton.”

“Of course not.” William left, closing the door behind him.

The judge asked his wife again if she wanted to go to her room, but she was in control of herself now and insisted that Mick repeat to her what he had told Beret and the judge. So Mick told his story again, and when he was finished, Varina thanked him for bringing them the news at once. Then she all but dismissed him, saying she was sure he had duties to attend to, that the judge would arrange to have Jonas buried. He would be interred in an unmarked grave, and there would be no service, of course.

Beret walked the detective to the door. “It was good of you to think of my aunt and uncle. This will be very hard on them,” she told him. “And on you,” she added. “I’ve known others, perhaps more than you have, who’ve been forced to kill, and I believe this will weigh on you for a long time, perhaps always.”

Mick looked away and didn’t reply.

“May we talk later?” Beret asked. “There are details I should like to know and loose ends to be tied up. And perhaps the two of us together can figure out why this happened. I think my aunt and uncle care only that it is done with, but I want to know why.” She also wanted to see Mick again, she realized. She liked being with him.

Mick leaned against the doorway, weary. It was dawn now. Beret saw that the street was awakening and was aware that it wouldn’t be long before everyone in the neighborhood knew that the Stantons’ driver had killed two women. Once the servants found out, the news would spread like dead leaves in the spring gusts.

A delivery wagon stopped at a stable not far away. A door closed. Across the street, a servant came out to sweep the walk. Nearby, a man climbed into a carriage, and the sound of it, noisy at first, faded as the vehicle reached the corner. Beret heard the song of a bird. Everything was the same as the morning she had stepped out onto the porch with her coffee, she thought, only for the Stanton household, nothing would ever be the same again. “Go now,” she told Mick. “I can wait until you’ve finished your duties and have slept. I believe you have not been to bed in twenty-four hours. Let me know when you can find time for me.”

Mick took Beret’s hand and squeezed it. He didn’t thank her. He was too tired, but as he started down the steps, he turned and muttered, “I’m sorry.”

“Yes, we all are.” Beret closed the door and hurried back to her aunt and uncle.

*   *   *

As Beret stepped inside the library, Varina abruptly broke off her conversation with the judge. Beret went to the silver pot and picked it up, offering coffee to her aunt, who declined, and her uncle, who pushed forward his fragile cup, white, with a gold rim, a cup much too dainty for a man. Beret replenished her own coffee, too.

“I wish I had a cup of chocolate,” Varina said, and Beret told her that she would go into the kitchen and ask for it. But Varina said no. The servants would be curious enough about the early visitor. She didn’t want them quizzing Beret.

The two older people were silent, and it occurred to Beret that she had intruded on a private conversation. She had sat down with her coffee, but now she rose and said she ought to return to her room.

“No, stay,” Varina said, and the judge looked at his wife, a question on his face. She told him, “This concerns Beret, too. She is family. The three of us, we’re all the family any of us has now.”

While Beret waited for Varina to continue, she glanced around the room, at the matching sets of books, bound in leather, the titles stamped in gold on the spines, the cherrywood paneling, the heavy furniture. The room, too dark for daytime, felt musty and cold, dead even, and Beret went to the window and opened the shutters, letting streaks of light fall onto the red Persian carpet. Then she pushed back the shutters, and the morning light flooded in. Beret had been in the library only in the evening and was surprised at how sunny it was during the day. The stream of light fell fully on her, and she blinked at the harshness, sitting down on a footstool to keep the glare out of her eyes. She looked from her aunt to her uncle then, but for a time, neither one spoke.

Then Varina went to the fireplace and picked up the poker. But she did not stir the fire, only held the brass rod as she turned to face Beret. In the morning light, she looked older than she had the night she’d gone to the Fisks’. Varina had wrinkles around her eyes and mouth, and the skin beneath her chin sagged. Her eyes glistened, and she gripped the poker as if she were defending herself. Beret could only imagine the terror and guilt her aunt felt at having brought Jonas into the house. So Varina’s words surprised her. They were not of disgust or shame or even compassion. Instead, she said, “We must put this unpleasantness behind us as quickly as possible.” Beret all but gasped. Her aunt thought Lillie’s death was
unpleasantness
? Perhaps that was just an unfortunate choice of words.

Varina continued. “This comes at an awkward time for us, Beret. Lillie’s death was bad enough, but it will be known now that Jonas, our own servant, was the fiend who killed her and the other one. This makes it even harder for your uncle.”

“I don’t understand,” Beret said. She was offended to think her aunt might be more concerned about her social standing than the deaths of two women, one of them her own niece.

“The Senate seat,” Varina said, waving the poker. Realizing it was in her hand, she set it down. “No one knew Lillie had gone into that place until she was murdered. After her death, we put it about that she was wild and we had only tried to help her—tried valiantly, I might say—since she was our niece, and well, of course, we had a duty. William was a great help with that, spreading the story among servants in other houses. And it took away any blame that attached itself to us, because everybody knows your uncle is a man of honor who would never turn his back on anyone in need. There was gossip, of course. There will always be gossip. But I think few blamed us for having taken a strumpet into our house.”

“Strumpet!” Beret said, shocked—and angry, too. “Surely you don’t refer to Lillie that way.”

“No, of course not,” the judge said quickly. He looked uneasy, and his forehead was damp.

Varina wrung her hands. “I’m sorry, Beret. It was a poor choice of words. But surely you see our dilemma. And now Jonas! It is a low blow and entirely unfair to your uncle, who does not deserve a second blot on his character.”

Beret was having trouble following the conversation. Varina’s niece had been murdered, her coachman revealed as a crazed killer. And her only concern seemed to be her husband’s ambition. Beret tried to reconcile herself to her aunt’s reasoning. Perhaps the woman was right. What was past was past. John Stanton should not be made to suffer because of the actions of others. Nor should her aunt. Still, Beret was surprised by the lack of compassion for the dead—Lillie, the crib girl Sadie, and even Jonas.

“Varina thinks you can help with this,” the judge said. He went to the decanter and poured himself a brandy and drank it down in one gulp. He was unshaven and looked haggard, old.

He turned to his wife to let her explain, and Varina said, “As you know, we’ve hoped you would stay on with us, at least for a few weeks, Beret. The spring is beautiful in Denver, and we think you might appreciate the rest and the care of your family after what you’ve been through. And God knows I could use my only niece for solace.” She paused, but Beret, edgy now, did not reply, so Varina continued. “People will be curious, and you will receive invitations because of it—and because you are a charming guest, too, of course. They won’t ask your uncle or me, but they’ll ask you about Jonas, and we thought if you told them how the judge had tried to rehabilitate him, how he had rescued him from the streets and given him employment, it would help our cause.”

“Your aunt, too, should be commended for her charity in regard to him,” the judge put in.

Varina inclined her head, accepting her husband’s words. “And as for Lillie, you could say she was uncontrollable, that you sent her to us to see if we could help her. You could imply that the course she took was all but inevitable, that it was her character, ever since she was a child.”

“But that’s not so,” Beret said.

“Isn’t it?” Varina asked. “You see, Beret, Lillie’s living here was very difficult for us. We couldn’t ask her to leave because she was our niece. But her loose ways reflected on your uncle and unfairly so.”

“Varina,” the judge interjected, and his wife gave him a pinched-nose look.

“Lillie’s nature was not Beret’s fault, of course, but she raised her. She threw Lillie out of their home.” She was addressing the judge now. “Certainly she would want to make up for her indiscretions by helping you, John.”

Beret closed her eyes and turned away. What her aunt had said was unfair. While she had asked Lillie to leave the New York home, Beret had never considered herself to be the cause of her sister’s sins. Now Varina was suggesting just that, and Beret was offended.

“Don’t do it if it distresses you,” the judge told her.

“No, of course not.” Varina smiled at her niece. “You have such a sense of honor. We would not want you to compromise it. You have many concerns—for the poor, the helpless, the women caught up in the evils of poverty. Think of the good your uncle could do if he had a voice in Washington. He could help those like Lillie, like Jonas. The cause is greater than what has happened here. You could have a voice in putting your uncle in a position to help others. I believe your mother and father would approve.”

Beret found the last remarks disingenuous, and she took her leave. As she started up the stairs, her uncle touched her arm, and Beret stopped. He said in a low voice, “You must forgive your aunt. She has worked hard on this Senate business, and now it’s as if her world has fallen apart. She mourns Lillie, but there is nothing she can do about her now. She has only the Senate appointment to look forward to. She deserves it.”

“As do you, Uncle.” But as she ascended the stairs and considered her uncle’s words, Beret knew that the Senate appointment was not her uncle’s goal but her aunt’s. She shuddered to think that her sister’s murder had become a political liability. Perhaps, as Varina had said, Beret had a duty to aid her uncle. After all, the investigation was over. Beret frowned and stopped a moment, grasping the rail. She was not so sure.

Chapter 16

Since Beret had slept little that night, she lay down on her bed to rest for a few moments, and to her surprise, she went to sleep and did not awaken until late in the morning. She rang for the maid, and in a moment, Nellie knocked on the door, then entered.

“Mr. and Mrs. Stanton’s gone out. You want your breakfast here or in the morning room, ma’am?”

“Here.”

“I’ll fetch it to you.” Nellie turned to go, then stopped. “Begging your pardon, ma’am, but is it true about Jonas? Did he really kill Miss Lillie, like Judge Stanton says?”

“It appears that way,” Beret said. “Are you surprised?”

Nellie twisted her hands in her apron. “I am, and I ain’t. He was strange, you know, and he scared me sometimes. He brought me a rock he found once, all pretty with sparkles in it. He said he saw it and saved it for me, and he didn’t want nothing for it, like some might. But another time, I saw him creep up on a bird and catch it and wring its neck. Jonas could be real friendly, and other times, it was like there’s a black cloud hanging over his head.”

“As if he were two different persons?”

Nellie nodded.

“Some men are like that, Nellie. I don’t know the reason for it.”

“He had no cause to kill Miss Lillie, I say.”

“No, there’s never a good reason to kill an innocent woman.”

“Oh, she wasn’t innocent, if that’s the word. Not her. And right in this house, too, and him being so much older. It was a scandal.” Nellie raised her hands to her face and said quickly, “Oh, ma’am, I’m sorry. I forgot for a minute you was her sister. I didn’t mean nothing by what I said, but I could tell you—”

Beret put up her hand to stop the maid. Too many people had already told her about her sister. She did not have to hear it all again. Perhaps she should have quizzed Nellie the other night about Lillie, as she had William and Jonas. After all, the maid would have known more about Lillie than anyone else. Nellie apparently was aware of the liaison between Lillie and Evan Summers. But what did it matter now? Jonas had been caught, and the murders were behind them. Listening to the blots on Lillie’s character was painful. Nellie seemed ready and even anxious to talk, but Beret dismissed her.