Starlight (16 page)

Yet the whole of the room awaited her next remarks.

“We all know that there may be difficulties in the future,” she said, voice clear and even. “With the arrival of Alex Christie as our new master, we have reason to hope that our expectations will be satisfied. We deserve to be heard.”

“Bully to that,” called a man with a raised fist. “How do you know he’s any different than the rest of the scheming masters? They take us for all we’re worth.”

“We haven’t had a raise in over a year.”

“The only concessions we’ve had are the new fans. But they use that as an excuse to dock our pay packets.”

“How many of us must be sacked before we strike back?”

“The new master won’t be any different. Don’t you make that mistake, young lady.”

Polly’s head spun with the anger spewing forth from so many mouths. The timbre in the room had shifted. Her authority was slipping away with each new angry comment.

“Unless tending the new master’s needs has given you special insight,” came another voice.

“Is that true, Polly?” A smirk of satisfaction shaped Sarah’s perfect lips. “Taken up with His Highness?”

Polly wanted to utter the first retort that came to mind.
No more than you’ve taken up with George Winchester.
But she kept quiet.

“Few of you have made the effort to know him,” she said. “Whatever I do is on behalf of our interests. Any who doubt that can take it up with me personally. Just remember how well I can swing a punch.” She aimed that last directly at Sarah.

The adults were scowling now. They were as frustrated as she, needing answers, needing guarantees. And they were spoiling for a fight. She had to end this. Now.

“Do you remember those moments in the mill?” she shouted. With an angry swipe, she tossed back curls made unruly by the dampness. “Men, have your wives told you how scared they were for their lives and for the lives of your children? Do you remember how we ran for the doors and nearly gave that unknown villain what he wanted? There’d have
been seventy dead, charred to a crisp. And what would the papers have said?”

“Animals.” Hamish’s voice was low, but it carried well. “We’d have been dubbed animals.”

“That’s right. I said it then and I mean it still. They’d have painted us as dumb Calton scum who hadn’t the sense to escape a burning building. The blame would’ve been pinned on one of our ranks, with all the sympathy directed at the masters who endure our agitation.”

Her head with throbbing with a heavy pulse. Her people were scared, and she could set them right. She could calm them when everyone else panicked, even if that meant no calm for her.

“So I ask you,” she continued, her voice harsh. “Is that how you want to be remembered? Because I refuse with all my strength. I will not be
defined
by others. I will not be
bullied
by others. And if you can’t stand with me, then I cannot be your leader.”

Silence greeted her words. Eyes flicked around the room, meeting other hostile, discouraged expressions. For her part, Polly found the only safe haven in the room. It should have been one of her brothers. Perhaps Les or Hamish. Her allies in this fight.

But it was Alex.

Again, she recognized his talent for communicating so much with so few alterations to his features. Just a shift of his eyes, a different set to his firm lips. She only felt . . . warmed. Supported by what she took to be admiration.

Whether or not it was true had no importance right then. She needed the fantasy. He was a harbor
amid the ever-strengthening voices that debated her future.

Among the men, Tommy postured and raised his fists. Hamish and Heath slipped quietly through the group and restrained him, using just enough force to hold him back without riling him further. She wondered what they said to ease the tension that twisted his back. She wondered what the others had said to rile him in the first place.

Bloody hell, she needed to corner him. Soon.

“So what say you, Calton weavers?” Her throat scratched and ached with the force of bellowing over so many opinions. “Will you give into this goading? Or will you follow me as you followed my da, toward a place of respect no one will deny?”

Some shouts of approval gave her hope. She lowered her voice. “I need you, my friends. So do our neighbors and families. Mrs. Dervish is out of work again because of her hip. Will we abandon her? Sammy Higgins. Are you here, man?”

“Aye, lassie.”

“Sammy’s eye is gone, an injury he suffered at Locksman Woolens. Will we abandon him, and his dear wife, Patrice? Because if we choose the path of violence, that is our fate. The strongest among us will be jailed, our voices stripped. The neediest among us will be left without aid. Then look at the babes you carry and imagine them orphans. I swear to you,
that
is the darkness we court.”

She paused, with another quick glance back to Alex. “And if we don’t find the culprit behind the damage at the Christie mill, we
will
be blamed for it.”

Talking could only take opinions so far. Da had always said as much. Eventually, one needed to step away and let minds come to their own conclusions. Those conclusions stayed firm.

So she exhaled and opened her hands. “It’s time to vote. I leave it to you, friends.”

She stepped down from the lectern and strode through the crowd that parted for her. After grabbing her tartan shawl off a hook, she left the hall. Only when out of sight did she lean against the nearest wall, close her eyes, and breathe.

The door opened, then closed just as abruptly.

She looked up, half expecting Alex to have followed her. What would he say? She couldn’t begin to guess. But it was Tommy Larnach.

Alex
stood rooted. His shoulders dug into the wall at his back.

He wanted to go after Polly, but he would be too conspicuous. Even watching the skinny, dark-haired lad follow her into the corridor was not inducement enough to make him move. He needed to see how this group of angered, scared people reacted to Polly’s measured plea. Her words had raised goose bumps along his bruised and aching nape. In the United States, her skills as an orator would’ve been a marvelous asset for those advocating workers’ rights.

Here, she could be the most potent threat to his business, his success, his future. And yet she had so eloquently advocated negotiation and finding the saboteur.

Finally, after minutes that dragged like weeks,
Connie Nells returned to the lectern. Interesting that a woman took control of the vote. Maybe it was another tactic to soothe the multitudes. Alex knew full well that had his father stood in her place, he wouldn’t have been able to refrain reiterating his position—and threatening those who disagreed. The man had charged through life, half brute and half cagey tycoon. Whether that was to be admired or frowned upon had depended on the moment.

However, the union needed even tempers.

Walt Nells only needed to clap his hands a few times. Everyone quieted and looked with mixed expressions toward his wife. Some anger. Some resolve. Some fatigued resignation. Alex had no guess as to the vote’s outcome.

“No more deliberations, I think.” Connie’s words carried about as much punch as she could muster, but with a peaceful Lowlands lilt—nearly a lullaby. “All in favor of opening the floor at the next meeting toward the purpose of suggesting new leadership, raise your hands. Hamish and Walt will take the count.”

Tense moments passed.

“Twenty-one,” called Hamish from one side of the room.

“That’s what I have,” Walt replied.

“The count stands at twenty-one. Now for Polly Gowan.” Connie wet her lower lip. She handled herself well, but public speaking was obviously not her strong suit. “As a reminder, Polly’s position would be known only to us, for her own safety and our combined success. The police will not respect
a woman at the head of our union. And the masters may not take our demands seriously. Graham Gowan would retain the official title. All in favor, raise your hands.”

Again Hamish and Walt circled the room. Alex tried to count, but his place against the back wall allowed no clear vantage.

“Thirty-six.”

“Aye.”

A whoop of approval surged up from the crowd. Alex breathed out. She was a tricky devil, but at least Polly Gowan was the devil he knew.

As people shared congratulatory smiles and handshakes, and as mothers roused their sleeping children, Alex slipped into the corridor. He did not want to be spotted. Polly’s success might be completely undone if anyone knew he had attended.

He stopped short. The dark-haired lad stood entirely too close to Polly. Detained by wiry arms, she fought with the wall at her back. They shouted at each other in unison. Their strong Glaswegian accents were incomprehensible when spoken at the same time, blending into a messy brogue, but their argument contained as much of the Lowlands dialect as English. There was no deciphering any of it.

Alex slammed the door to the meeting hall.

As one, they turned toward him. The lad grinned, nasty and severe. Polly showed no hint of reaction. How did she do that? Without preamble or apology, she shoved the young man’s bony chest. Then she hissed something Alex couldn’t understand—maybe more of that Scots language.

The lad only laughed. His eyes remained sharp and dangerous.

Alex’s scalp throbbed with an oncoming headache. “What the hell is going on?”

Polly didn’t look back as she strode past. “Not your business, master.”

He caught up quickly. But he didn’t touch her, not with a pair of dark, keen eyes upon them. “Aren’t you curious how the vote came down?”

“I won. There would’ve been a brawl otherwise. All that violence unleashed in the guise of celebration. In the meantime they must to be civil.” She shook her head, as if remembering her present company. Then she huffed a sharp breath—her only sign of relief. “I’m going home.”

“No, you’re not.” He opened the door for her and forced her to meet his gaze. “You’re going to take me to Old Peter’s.”

“You need no direction. I’ve heard tell you visited already.”

“Fine,” Alex said tightly. “Let’s frame my instructions with more precision. Tonight, Miss Gowan, I want answers.”

Alex
walked through the darkened city with Polly at his side. Her pace was everything reluctant. Slouched shoulders. Slowed steps. She kept her eyes on the cobblestones, and tipped the crown of her head against the gusty winds whipping down the street. Frenzied hair trailed out behind her.

She was a creature he’d never thought to imagine. A woman unlike any he’d ever known. Rough-hewn
and cheeky, resilient and stubborn. Her boldness called to him.

That boldness tempted him toward thoughts he had no business thinking. Hard thoughts. Charged with sex and expectation. His nighttime fantasies made real. Primal and powerful, his hands shook with his effort to maintain some reserve.

He wanted her, yes. But nothing about her could be trusted. Those kisses . . . All in service of the union? His stomach turned over at the idea. That would make her a prostitute and him a complete and utter fool.

“I still don’t understand where you get the right to haul me down to the docks in the middle of the night. I worked twelve hours today. I just fought to keep the union peaceable, which will benefit us both. And now we’re back to you and your ham-handed demands.” She scowled at him from under her thick lashes, which clumped together in the damp, heavy air.

“Who was he?”

“What?”

Alex didn’t relent. Her guileless nature was about as innocent as that of a naughty little sprite. Whatever interaction they sustained from now on would mean keeping that fact front and center in his mind . . . especially as he caught hints of her scent. That pervasive machine oil, layered over a woman’s feminine, floral perfume. The combination addled his senses.

“The young man. Dark hair. He spoke against you at the meeting—was the first to advocate violence, in
fact. Then to find you in the hallway, arguing? What am I supposed to make of that, Miss Gowan?”

“Back to Miss Gowan, eh? Well enough. We were getting a little too chummy.”

Chummy.
Alex shook his head at her understatement.

The streets became narrower and murkier as they walked down from Gallowgate. Dockside tenements huddled like rain-soaked soldiers in a muddy trench. No warmth to the fires and scant lights. Upon his first, fruitless trip to Old Peter’s, Alex had hoped to find conditions better than his grim imaginings. If anything, they were far worse: desolate and worn, pitted by the rot of dank harbor waters and clouded by the poison of countless smokestacks. That didn’t take into account whatever hid behind closed shutters and shadow-strewn stoops.

Polly walked on with no apparent notice of her surroundings, until she veered down a slim alleyway.

“A trade for a trade,” he said to her stiff back.

She stopped. Turned. Tilted her head. “How so?”

“I tell you something of importance to you, and you tell me who he was.”