Fallen Women (27 page)

“Hidden what?”

“Contraband. Stolen articles. I would like you to return my sister’s diamond earrings, the ones shaped like stars. Jonas stole them. If you give them to me now, I shall not tell Judge Stanton. But if you won’t, then the police will arrest you.”

Tom looked around wildly. “I didn’t steal no earrings, miss. I took those pictures, but I didn’t take nothing else. You look around and see. Lookit here. This is where I keep my things.” He pried loose a board from the bottom of the wall, revealing a sugar sack. Tom removed it and handed it to Beret, who emptied it onto the boy’s cot. The contents were a collection of odds and ends that might have come from a packrat’s nest. There were several marbles, a toy horse with one leg broken, the makings for cigarettes, and two gold coins. He would have taken the coins from Jonas’s box, but there was no way Beret could prove it. Underneath were more girlie pictures. “Jonas give me them. They wasn’t of no consequence,” Tom admitted when Beret picked them up. “There ain’t nothing else. I didn’t steal no earrings,” he repeated.

He might have taken the earrings and sold them, Beret thought, but when would he have done that? He would not have known until a few hours earlier that Jonas was dead. “I should like you to turn out your pockets,” she told the boy, who obliged, perhaps because they contained nothing of interest. If Tom had taken the earrings, he could have hidden them anywhere in the stable, and she would have no way of finding them, Beret realized. “All right, Tom,” she said. She had been peremptory with the boy, and her voice softened now. “There will be a reward for the earrings. If you find them, I will pay you a hundred dollars, which is far more than they would bring on the street. And I won’t tell Judge or Mrs. Stanton. Are we understood?”

Tom’s eyes were wide. “A hunnert dollars? If I find them, I’ll bring them to you. I sure will, miss.”

Beret nodded, and picking up the newspapers and cheese box, she started to leave, but Tom touched her arm. “Miss?”

Beret jumped, chilled by the touch.

“Why do you think Jonas cut up that picture like he done? He showed me the others, but I never seen that one till I went looking.”

“I don’t know, Tom. Maybe he hated prostitutes because his mother was one.”

Tom stared at Beret. “Oh no, miss. Jonas told me she was a nurse. He said she went in a mine at Georgetown to save some men and got killed in a cave-in. They never found her body. She’s an angel up in heaven. Jonas told me that, too.” He paused. “You think Jonas is up there with her now?”

She shrugged. There was no need to tell Tom that Jonas had made up the story about his mother, probably to elevate himself in the younger boy’s eyes. Jonas might even have believed it. Nor would she tell Tom that instead of being in heaven, Jonas was more likely burning in the fires of hell.

Chapter 17

To her disappointment, Beret did not receive word from Mick McCauley to meet with him the following day. So she accompanied her aunt to a luncheon at which a group of young ladies in Greek attire performed a tableau. Still caught up in Jonas’s death, Beret paid little attention to the display and later found it difficult to be charming and entertaining. When the discussion turned to how awful it must have been for Judge and Mrs. Stanton to learn that the young man they had engaged to drive their carriage had turned out to be a demented killer, Beret merely nodded, barely able to engage in conversation.

Several women confided to Beret that they had been a little afraid of the strange coachman and had almost refused to ride in the Stanton carriage, and one confessed she had asked dear Varina why she had hired someone so repulsive.

“Aunt Varina has always been aware of the needs of the disadvantaged,” Beret replied, wishing her aunt had not subjected them both to the unpleasant afternoon. Was the luncheon really that important to the judge’s appointment to the Senate?

“Yes, of course, but to take that fellow into her home. Why, you all could have been murdered in your sleep.”

The woman was right, although Beret wouldn’t admit that to her. “But we weren’t,” she replied. “My aunt is the soul of compassion. And my uncle, too,” she added, thinking this was the sort of conversation the judge hoped she would engage in. “If those of us who are privileged don’t reach out to the poor, who will?”

“Had she any hint?” someone asked.

“No, of course not.” Beret paused to gain control of herself and added, “Aunt Varina would have dismissed him if she had, of course.”

“Well, it gives us all pause. From now on, I will insist on at least three references for anyone I hire. Will you have cake?” She handed a plate to Beret, as she added, “And then there was that awful murder of your sister. What do you say about that?”

Beret took a slice of cake and picked up her fork, as she replied, “I have always heard Denver was lovely in the spring, and now I can see it for myself. I spied a clump of violets in the garden this morning, so pretty and fresh. My dear aunt suggested I pick them for my room. I love violets, don’t you?”

The woman looked disappointed, for she surely wanted to gossip about the murders. Perhaps Beret should inform them that it was their husbands, fathers, and brothers who kept the whorehouses thriving. They were the patrons of the finer brothels—they might even have been Lillie’s clients—and they owned the blocks along Holladay Street where the prostitutes plied their trade, making far more money off the business of prostitution than did the girls. But of course, that was never a topic of conversation among ladies. Beret could only wonder what the women would have said about Lillie if she or her aunt hadn’t been there. Varina was right in wanting Beret to accompany her if for no other reason than to keep down the gossip.

Before she left, Beret was invited to two or three other social engagements and knew that she could spend all her idle time in Denver involved in useless entertainments—afternoons and evenings that would be as dull as this one. As long as she was in Denver, she had no excuse to turn them down without giving offense. Before, she might have said she was busy with Detective McCauley, but the murders had been solved. So for her aunt’s sake she accepted the social obligations, although she wished she might get the plague or be bitten by a rabid dog before they took place. She hoped she could return to New York soon without offending her aunt and uncle.

Varina was much pleased with Beret’s performance, and when they returned home, driven by the stable boy, Tom, Varina announced she had engaged her dressmaker to alter Lillie’s dresses for Beret, and the woman, a Mrs. Beaton, would be waiting for them. So even if Detective McCauley had sent for her, Beret could not have met with him that day.

The dressmaker was trying. Beret stripped down to her corset and let her aunt and Mrs. Beaton fit the dresses on her. “You are not as well constructed as your sister, poor girl,” the woman said. “She had a fuller figure.” Then apparently afraid she had given offense, she added, “You are more statuesque. I always liked a tall figure. It shows off a gown to perfection.”

Beret searched for something to still the woman without giving offense. But the dressmaker continued. “A lovely girl. Such a shame.” She had mastered the challenge of talking with her mouth full of pins.

“Yes.”

“I made this yellow gown for her,” the woman hurried on. “You remember, don’t you, Mrs. Stanton? The fabric was costly, but she said she had to have it, and oh, wasn’t she a beauty in it?” She stood back and looked at Beret critically. Yellow, Beret knew, was not her color, and the dress, cut low and fulsome in the front, was anything but flattering. “I’ll take it in at the bust, perhaps add a little lace there to tone down the color. And the hem must be let out. A bit of trim will cover the crease, and no one will know.”

And so it went with Lillie’s other dresses, the dressmaker muttering how she would have to alter the gowns, making Beret wish she had refused the clothes. It was bad enough the dresses were unflattering, but she felt uncomfortable in her sister’s garments. Finally, Beret tried on one of Lillie’s sensible ensembles, a suit of navy blue with simple lines. “Ah, at last, this suits you,” Mrs. Beaton said. She pushed and pulled and pinned. “I thought it too plain for your sister, but she looked striking in it.” She paused and added quickly, “And you will, too, Miss Osmundsen.” As the woman used chalk to draw a line down a seam to show where the jacket should be altered, she turned to Varina. “I made you a suit very nearly like this one. It was from the same material. Do you wear it? It was larger, of course. You hardly have the figure of a young girl.” The woman must be a very good dressmaker, Beret thought, or Varina would not have stood for the insult.

“It is too severe,” Varina replied.

“Then fetch it to me, and I’ll add a lace collar or a bit of trim to soften it.”

Varina looked uncomfortable. “I do not care for it much,” she said, and appeared relieved when Nellie entered the room and said some problem required her mistress’s attention.

The moment Varina was gone, the dressmaker said in a low voice, “I wonder your dear aunt can show her face. Her coachman’s deeds must be a terrible strain on her. Does she suffer?”

Beret found the question no more appropriate than those asked at the luncheon, and she knew the dressmaker would savor her reply to share with other clients. “I believe everyone suffers when a human life is cut short.”

Mrs. Beaton frowned. “Yes, but Mrs. Stanton, how is she taking it?”

“As you might expect,” Beret replied.

“Did she know her coachman was a killer?”

“I don’t suppose she would have employed him if she had, would she?”

“And the judge, what is his reaction?” the woman asked.

“I haven’t inquired.”

Mrs. Beaton looked at Beret sharply. “You act as if this man was of no consequence.”

“Murder is always of consequence.” Beret was tired of the dressmaker’s persistence and wished the woman would swallow her mouthful of pins.

The dressmaker sighed, and with a false sense of pity, she said, “Those poor girls. My church helps them. We have found farms to send them to so that they can leave their sinful lives, but they are never grateful. Some sneer at us when we offer them that opportunity. Others run away after a few days and return to Holladay Street.” She shook her head, apparently at the ingratitude.

“Many of them come from farms. That is why they turn out,” Beret told her.

“Well, Miss Lillie didn’t, did she?” the woman said, then asked, “Surely Mrs. Stanton feels responsible for her death, doesn’t she?”

Beret, mindful that the dressmaker was sticking pins into the garment she was wearing, took a deep breath and said quietly, “I found violets in the garden this morning. My aunt insisted I pick them for my room. Aren’t they pretty?” Beret pointed to a small glass vase shaped like a flower basket. “Violets are the harbinger of spring, don’t you think?” She stepped out of the skirt then and laid it on the bed.

Mrs. Beaton removed the pins from her mouth and thrust them into her pincushion. Then she pushed herself off the floor and gathered up her scissors and tape measure and stored them in her workbasket. Beret smiled benignly at the woman. No one would make her gossip about her own family.

*   *   *

Beret was disappointed that Detective Sergeant McCauley had not contacted her again, so the following afternoon, she left the house and walked to City Hall. She was delighted at how much the weather had changed in only a few days. Flowers had begun to emerge. There were daffodils and tiny white flowers like edelweiss, crocuses and violets in the yards she passed. A gardener trimmed bushes in front of a sandstone castle. Two nurses sat on a wall at the side of one of the mansions, gossiping while their tiny charges played in the grass. Beret nodded a greeting, and the two stood and mumbled, “Ma’am.”

A groom slouched against a barn, smoking, his eyes sullen as he appraised Beret. He looked away as someone yelled to him from inside. The sun was warm on Beret’s shoulders, and by the time she reached the bottom of the hill, she had unbuttoned her jacket. The streets were dry now, although dusty, the air clean, the sun so bright it hurt her eyes. For the first time, Beret found Denver a pretty place, serene, quiet, so different from the bustle of New York.

The activity picked up as she left the residential area, however. Beret found herself being careful of the carriages and wagons that rushed by, careless of pedestrians. A man astride a horse nearly knocked her down and did not have the courtesy to apologize or even to look back. Another doffed his hat impudently and Beret ignored him. Perhaps Denver was not so different from New York after all. Still, she enjoyed the walk, the chance to get out of the house and away from the stuffy drawing rooms of her aunt’s friends, and she was almost sorry to reach her destination. But she had come with a purpose, and would not delay it. She went into the building and down the stairs to the police department.

Detective McCauley was not at his desk, and Beret wondered if she should have sent him a note, asking for an appointment. The reason she hadn’t was if he had ignored it, she’d have been in a quandary about her next move. She looked around the room but didn’t see the detective, so she inquired of an officer who was stationed near the door.

“Mick? A bit of a hero, our Mick is today, ma’am. P’raps you know he killed the man what’s been troubling the whores … begging your pardon. I didn’t mean to suggest that’s a subject you’d be knowing about, a lady like you. I expect you’re one of his society friends. You wait over there at his desk if you want to. He’s talking to Chief Smith now. Shouldn’t be more than a minute. The chief don’t talk much, you know, but us boys has got to listen.” He guffawed.

Beret thanked the officer and made her way across the room to Mick’s station and sat down on a hard chair. The desk was tidy, pencils lined up next to the pen with the dull nib, an open bottle of ink beside it. Government forms were stacked to one side, and in the center was what appeared to be the page of a letter. But when she looked closer, Beret saw that it was part of a police report. The first line was the tail end of a sentence begun on the previous page: “shot him once in the breast, and he fell onto the bed and was still. He had the knife in his hand yet. I asked a crib girl to find another officer, and in ten minutes—” Mick had obviously been interrupted in the middle of a sentence and left his desk. Beret would have liked to read the first part of the report, but she was mindful of the glances from the officers in the room. So she picked up a pencil and idly rolled it back and forth between her gloved fingers, trying to imagine what else the detective had written. She was doing that when Detective McCauley returned.