A Lesson in Love and Murder (9 page)

She looked more closely at the desk. Not so tidy today. The
telephone had toppled over and ink spots stained the wood. She picked up a scrap of paper and read closely.

It was hard to make out Ray's shaky hand.

Chicago

Vi—

Tony Docks

MICH AVE

Need $

Anarchists? Accident?

Were the anarchists and Jonathan in Chicago? Had Ray tracked them that far?

Her thoughts drummed in her head even as a soft footfall at the front of the office drew her immediate gasp.

“Merinda!” the voice whispered.

Merinda let the torch guide her out of Ray's cubby and toward the door, her knuckles gripping her stick in case of immediate need of defense.

“Benny!” The light illuminated him.

“I returned the horse. Got Jemima safe to your house and Mrs. Malone. Took a moment to bandage her head. It will be as right as rain. I didn't know where her house was, but I have a rather remarkable memory when it comes to remembering where I have been before and… ”

“Cracker jacks, Benny! How did you find me?”

“Oh. I tracked you.”

“You what?”

He motioned at her stick. “There. You didn't notice, but I studied your boot print when we left the alley just over there.”

In response, Merinda lifted up her boot and inspected it under the torchlight.

“See?” Benny said.

There was a tack stuck in the sole that she had never noticed before.

“If that marker wasn't enough” he said brightly, “then you do have an incessant habit of tapping that stick about.”

“Cracker jacks,” she repeated. Even though there was but a sliver of light, the entire dank space seemed illuminated with some kind of spark.

“What is this place?”

“Remember the advertisement that led you to Jem and me? This is the
Hogtown Herald
office.”

“I don't know much about newspaper offices,” Benny said, approaching Merinda and sharing the torchlight, “but I never thought they would look like this.”

“It isn't one of Toronto's
finest
papers,” Merinda admitted.

“You thought you might find something here?”

“The
Hog
always reports on things that the other papers refuse to. Most likely because each managing editor is bought by Toronto's elite… I'm rambling.” Merinda spun on her heel.

“You thought they might have something on Jonathan?”

“If these trolley accidents are not accidents, then I am pretty sure one of my friends would have the same suspicions you do. Jasper, of course. He's the officer you met earlier. Though he wasn't himself tonight, I assure you. Usually the most amiable fellow in the world and… ” Merinda bit her lip, changing thought midstream. “And Ray DeLuca. Jem's Ray DeLuca. I thought he might have left something.” She thought of the note in her pocket.

“And did he?”

“I can't be sure.”

Silence stretched between them. Benny stood straight at attention, and she wished that he would twirl his cap on his finger or bury his hands in his pockets. Anything, really. But his body language was rigid, and his face in the half shadow was tired and sad.

A half moment later, during which she tried to make out his features more clearly in the darkness, the overhead light buzzed and sparked.

Benny instinctively pushed Merinda behind him, but when she looked around his broad shoulder, she made out the tawny hair and lanky frame of Skip McCoy.

“Miss Herringford!” he squawked. “I just forgot something.” He looked back at the door he had found slightly ajar. “You broke in?”

“DeLuca forgot something. Told me to get it.”

It was good enough explanation for Skip, somehow, as he dashed over to his desk and began looking about. “Well, at least you didn't trip over anything,” he said jovially.

“My friend and I will leave you. Sorry about the door.”

“The lock was probably broken anyway,” Skip said with a shrug.

Merinda and Benny walked out over the cobblestones. “Thanks for seeing Jem home,” she said after a moment.

“My absolute pleasure. Your housekeeper was more than happy to see her safely inside.”

“We're neither of us frail women who just topple over in crowds,” Merinda said hastily. “Just in case you were of the opinion that… ”

“Merinda, the place was overcrowded and there was so much shoving and pushing. Your friend was injured regardless of gender. How could that possibly have any bearing on my respect for your proficiency as a detective?”

Merinda was glad the clouds chose that very moment to shroud the brightening moon as she turned and smiled.

She made out Jasper from afar, deep in conversation with Tipton. He was raising his voice, or what little of a voice he had left after shouting orders and spending a long hour in smoky conditions.

Benny walked Merinda as far as the trolley station and waited until the streetcar chugged to a stop. They parted, Benny returning to his hotel and Merinda to King Street. Once seated, she pressed her forehead to the glass and watched him walk away. He had a confident stride, especially for one who confessed the city was so unfamiliar to him.

Tipton and Jones had departed, leaving Jasper amid the debris. The last stragglers had left. And the space that had just been filled with noise was eerily silent. No casualties, thank God, but several injured and terrified people. His eyes swept around the abandoned warehouse. An hour before, it had been alive with the movement and raised voices of people stirred in conviction. Now he stood, blood stains and torn cloth and ripped papers at his feet.

His eyes narrowed and focused, trained in to find something, anything. And they settled and focused on the slightest bit of
something.
Jasper knelt down. There it was. Not for the first time. A strange little knot… well what had
once
been a strange little knot. Not seared or singed as the same that had been found at the explosive scenes. Whoever was setting the bombs had been at the rally. Jasper may have passed the fellow. He held it out to the lone bulb sputtering overhead and then tucked it in his pocket.

His city was a barrel of gunpowder waiting to be set off. A canon, a gun.

He looked furtively around him. Tipton could ignore this all he wanted, Montague could focus his influence on sending his brute squad to interrupt an otherwise peaceful rally, but Jasper knew the truth. This was more than a few anarchists trying to make a point. This was imminent and purposeful death.

Jem couldn't quite remember how she found herself spread comfortably on the settee in Merinda's front room, tucked in comfortably with a blanket from a nearby chair. A fuzzy memory made out Benny, that kind Mountie who had saved her from the crowd.

She pressed the heel of her palm to her pounding head. She expected her wandering fingers would find sticky blood just congealed. Rather, they found a bandage, clean and carefully applied.

She sat up long enough for Mrs. Malone to fuss over her while praising the resourceful young man who had seen to her medical
attention, but just as she was beginning to mumble something about needing to go home, she dozed off again.

When next she woke, it was in a scene as familiar as breathing. Light cast prisms on the Persian carpet, Mrs. Malone was busy in the kitchen getting the tea things ready, and Merinda's footsteps bounded down the staircase, her voice raucous in her demand for Turkish coffee.

Jem held her hand to her injured head. “Shhh!” she croaked.

“Not dead then?” Merinda was chipper.

Jem glanced at the clock in the corner. “Merinda, it is eight o'clock in the morning. You never rise this early!”

“I wanted to make sure you weren't dead,” Merinda said easily.

Jem snorted. “Liar.”

“Skip is interviewing me for the
Hog.
” Merinda bounced happily to her hearthside chair and accepted the pot and strainer Mrs. Malone set besides her. “You'll stay for breakfast?”

“I should get home. Ray will be worried sick.”

“I'll have Mrs. Malone telephone for a cab.”

Jem accepted the offer, and a quarter of an hour later she was ascending her own walkway.

It was colder than usual inside the house, and she noticed that neither the gas nor the fires had been lit the night before. Thinking Ray had probably fallen asleep at his desk again, she turned in the direction of the telephone, only to remember it had been cut off. But in the kitchen above the teakettle, she found a note.

J—

Had to go to Chicago. Viola in trouble. Finding Tony. Unsure of when I will return. Maybe stay at King Street?

R.

He had left no means of contact.

She took a moment, sinking onto the settee in her little mismatched parlor, her head throbbing something fierce, her heart clutched in a tight bind she couldn't name. Finally, she rose and went up the stairs.

She opened a trunk and began folding in corsets and stockings, dresses and stays, shoes and trousers over the lavender scented paper, tucking clothes carefully, at once prim and lace, coarse and tweed.

She inspected her dressing table and found that Ray's pocket watch, a memento as valuable to her as her wedding ring, did not occupy its usual space.

An hour later, Mrs. Malone was helping her settle into her old room. Little familiarities surrounded her—lavender in a vase, a cameo, a few dress patterns, a favorite quilt, a forgotten notebook and pen.

Still tired from the ordeal of the evening before and her head throbbing worse than before, she enjoyed a nap in her old, comfortable bed. Upon rising, she noticed that the sun was slanting more brightly through the window, marking midday. Voices rose from the front room. She checked her hair in the mirror and readjusted the small bandage.

In the sitting room, she found Merinda and Skip.

“Jem! I didn't know you were back,” Merinda cried. Skip stood and gave her a quick nod as she lowered herself to the settee. “Skip was just doing a first-rate job of an interview.”

Jem looked between them. “I got the oddest note from Ray. He's gone.”

“Gone where?” Merinda asked.

“To Chicago. Something about Viola and Tony.”

“Chicago!” Skip repeated.

“He's going to find Tony. He doesn't know when he'll be back.”

“Skip here will be perfecting more than his interviewing skills. Why, he'll have several more jobs at the paper,” Merinda said lightly, even while her face shaded with concern.

“I have to go.” Skip suddenly slapped his hands on his knees.

“But we weren't finished,” Merinda protested.

“I have more than enough. Remember that it's not just your perspective I was assigned to get. McCormick is out interviewing a few of Goldman's followers, and I am charged with seeing Mrs. Goldman herself.”

“How exciting,” Merinda said without even the slightest attempt to hide her disappointment.