Alias Dragonfly (16 page)

Another door opened. I was pushed into a room down onto a carpeted floor that smelled of pomade, rust and musk oil perfume. No light from the room was visible through my blindfold. The door closed with a thud, followed by the sound of a lock clicking shut.

I struggled to my feet, my bound hands in front of me. I groped around the room, feeling for any furnishings, any other doors. Nothing.

I heard a knocking. What in heaven’s name was happening?

“Yes?” I answered. There was silence. “Who’s there?” I tried to keep my voice low and calm. Another knock. I fumbled my way to the door. I groped around it, feeling for a knob. The door was flat. No knob. There was no way to open it. Now what?

Suddenly the door swung open, nearly smacking me in the face. Before it closed, there was enough light through my blindfold to see that a female form had come into the room carrying a lamp and a stool. Her head was down so I couldn’t see her face.

“Sit,” she ordered. I stayed right where I was. She put the lamp on the floor. She grabbed my shoulders and forced me to the stool.

“What is your name?” I raised my head. “Don’t look up.” She spat the words. “Answer!” She grasped my chin, pulling off the gag.

My hands were sweating, and my wrists were getting numb from the tight, tight binding. Someone else was in the room. I smelled gardenias, and strong tobacco.

“We’ve captured your father,” a man said.

My hands shook. I willed them to stop. Dear God, my father . . .

“Sergeant Summoner Bradford. Of the Second New Hampshire. Those cowards ran like rats in fire smoke at Bull Run.” His voice was slow, deliberate, and now, in my ear.

“He did not run!” I was shouting. “Don’t you dare hurt him. Keep me, and let him go. He knows nothing about—”

The woman chuckled. “Do you know a Yankee spy called Timothy Webster?” she demanded.

“No!” I shouted. Mr. Webster was known to them. My God.

“Liar!” she hissed.

“What do we do with her?” the man asked.

“She’ll talk after I’m done,” the woman said. “If not, shoot her.”

I heard them leave the room. Again, the door closed and locked. If they were going to kill me, I’d give them a fight! I waited, hearing my heart beating in my ears. I twisted my hands against the rope, but they wouldn’t come free.

At least twenty minutes passed by my count. The air grew more stifling. What was happening? Would I be here forever?

I lowered myself to the floor. I pitched and rolled and bucked my body up and down along the floor.

When I reached the door, I kicked it with both of my legs. It didn’t move. What next? My hair was tied back with a velvet ribbon, and a wide-toothed comb fastened the rest. I shook my head furiously until the comb fell out. I grabbed it in my mouth and continued my thrashing. Finally, my wrists burning and raw, I freed one of my hands from the rope by twisting them. I tore off the blindfold and slid my other hand free. The room was so dark. I held the comb to my eyes, and broke it, leaving a long, sharp piece.

I heard footsteps. Someone was approaching. The door opened. I raised the jagged comb. As a man came in, I stepped in front of him. He grabbed my hand, twisting it, but not before I stabbed the comb into his wrist. He cried out in pain.

“Enough!” a woman shouted. I heard the door swing open.

Suddenly the room was flooded with lights.

I blinked hard, dizzy and nauseated. I tried to run but smacked right into a large cart, piled with food. Cakes, sandwiches and a teapot crashed to the floor.

I saw that the woman binding the man’s bleeding hand with my blindfold was Mrs. Warn! Two other women stood there, smiling. One was older, fair haired and wore silver-rimmed spectacles. The other was small with red hair. I recognized her. She was the woman from the park, the one who called me Fiona. What was happening?

I may sound calm now in the telling, but I swear I was so stunned by what I was seeing that my head whirled, and my knees were so wobbly that I could hardly remain standing.
Don’t take it all in at once
, I told myself.
Focus on one person at a time. Try to calm down.

I looked at Mrs. Warn.
Focus hard,
I said to myself. Remember I’d never really seen her face until then. It was narrow, her chin and cheekbones prominent, her lips full but at that moment, set in a hard line. She had wide-set blackish-brown eyes that looked like they were shooting sparks straight at me. She was wearing a plain black frock with an embroidered lace collar. Mrs. Warn didn’t look like a powerful woman at all. She looked like a little brown wren. Her hair was up and fastened in a wilted chignon. She was shorter than I remembered.

“Tea is waiting, dears,” the older lady said, salvaging what she could from the mess on the floor. “I’m Agnes Crawford,” she said to me, “and of course you know Jane Smith from the park.” Jane Smith? A name as common as a dust speck, I thought. An alias, likely. “And perhaps you’ve seen Mr. Riley, or bought some of his lovely blossoms?” In spite of the fact that I’d just stabbed him, the man she called Mr. Riley smiled at me. The scent of blossoms that emanated from him was overpowering, and I knew then that he was the flower seller just near the Greenhow house.

“Good work, Miss,” Mr. Riley said, the cloth on his hand now stained with blood.

Mrs. Crawford went breezily on. “And Mrs. Warn you’ve met, of course.”

“I’m sorry I hurt you,” I said to Mr. Riley, ignoring Mrs. Warn.

“Don’t be,” Mrs. Warn said. “Don’t ever be sorry.”

“Just a scratch,” Mr. Riley added.

Jane Smith handed me a wet cloth. “Wash up, now, Madeline Bradford, and oh, my, your little wrists are a bit red, aren’t they?” She reached into her apron pocket and produced a tiny pot of something creamy. “Put this on the scratches, and they’ll be gone by morning.” She watched as I rubbed in the ointment. “Better?”

“Yes,” I mumbled. They weren’t.

“Mrs. Crawford has made some lovely raisin scones,” Jane Smith said cheerfully. “Are you hungry?”

“I’m starved, thanks,” I said loudly, though my body was cold and I was shaking all over. I hid my trembling hands at my side.

“Good girl,” Jane Smith said, clapping me on the back. “Good!”

Mrs. Crawford bustled off, humming. Soon she was back with a new tray of pastries, sandwiches and a steaming pot of tea. Mr. Riley pulled side chairs and a table from a closet.

Mrs. Warn did not look at me or speak all through the meal. Though the first bite of the scone stuck in my throat, I forced a swallow. Mrs. Warn handed me a sandwich.

“Thank you,” I said, meeting her steady, piercing gaze. The salty ham and brown bread looked wonderful. I took a few bites, never taking my eyes off her. Was that a look of approval, admiration, even, on her face?

A bell clanged three times in the hallway. They all looked up, waiting. It clanged twice more. Mrs. Crawford hurried to answer it. I heard laughter, and a loud, “Oh, you rascal!” from Mrs. Crawford, and a high guffaw. She came in, followed by the little man called Mikey. They were laughing like crazy at some silliness they shared.

“Time to go home, Fiona,” Mikey said, pulling back my chair. He blew a kiss to Mrs. Crawford, and then danced a little Irish jig, leaping in the air and landing at her feet.

“Oh, the scamp,” she said, blushing.

Before we left, Mrs. Warn handed me my shawl and my gun.

“I’ll inform Mr. Pinkerton that you . . . tolerated . . . the exercise,” she said.

“Do you live here, Mrs. Warn?” I asked. The bit of food I’d eaten, and the realization that they were not really my enemies, made me feel stronger.

“This is Mrs. Warn’s school. I’m one of her . . . graduates,” Jane Smith said proudly. She indicated the two men sitting in the corner, stuffing more food in their mouths. “And Mike there, well, he’s one of our best, as is Mr. Riley.”

Mike led me down the stairs of the house I’d been brought to as a captive. I kept blinking in the faint light of dawn. I’d been there all night! If I didn’t know better, I would have supposed that a fine, well-bred family lived here. Well, in a way, they were a family, just not like any I could have imagined.

“Well, Fiona, you held your own, and didn’t buckle under, that’s what I heard,” Mike said, skipping along beside me.

“Thanks.” I remembered the bile in my throat and the burning in my wrists. My legs were still weak. “I thought I’d been captured by Rebels. I figured they’d kill me.”

“And you didn’t break,” Mike said. “I’m proud of you.”

I was proud of myself. “Is Mrs. Warn always so hard on her . . . students?” I leaned down to catch his answer.

“She has to be,” he said. “Especially since you’re so young, and all. She has to know if you can measure up.”

“What about you, Mike?”

“I bless the day Mrs. Warn laid eyes on me,” he said, with a tone of reverence in his voice. “She found me working with an organ grinder. I was the monkey. He made me wear an old fur suit and monkey head that stank worse than a rotting horse. When the war started, we’d be just across from the President’s House. Those congressmen gave a mighty lot of pennies, and talked real free, talked Rebel stuff. They spouted off about who was resigning and who wanted to put a hole in Mr. Lincoln’s head. They talked plenty around an animal and his keeper. Mrs. Warn happened by and put an extra penny in my hand. She treated me good, and figured right away I wasn’t a real monkey. One day I told her what I was hearing.” Mike’s face was full of adoration. “A few days later, Mrs. Warn bought me from the organ grinder. He gave me up easy. Money does that. After that, Mr. Pinkerton schooled me in their ways and took me on. I’d die for them,” he said.

As we neared the boardinghouse, a familiar black-haired young man with a bouquet of carnations in his hands limped into the street calling my name.

I gasped.

“Know him, or what?” Mike said, pulling a small knife from under his hat, and concealing it in his hand.

Joy and anger made a broth that bubbled on an invisible stove inside me, just at the sight of Jake Whitestone. “Yes. I do. He boards with my aunt as well.”

“Keep walking,” Mike said. “I’ll be nearby if you need me. Over by Mr. Riley’s stand, okay? Go inside.”

Hard as it was, I turned my back on Jake and hurried into the house. He followed me.

“Both of you come and go like stray cats!” Aunt Salome berated me and Jake as Nellie passed us mountains of food. We didn’t eat a bite. Jake kept trying to catch my eye. I kept looking away. “Where have you gotten to, Mr. Whitestone? The board is overdue,” my aunt said through a mouthful of food.

“Madeline, you’ve still got the fever. Look at you.”

Was my face that flushed?

“Sorry, Mrs. Hutton,” Jake said, producing several gold pieces. “I’ve been rather busy.”

She grabbed them up and bit down on them to see if they were real.

“Excuse me, Aunt,” I said, fleeing the table, my heart and head in a tumble. I was so happy to see Jake, and yet, now that I was a spy, I sure didn’t want him writing about me in any way, or following me!

I ran into the parlor. He was right behind me. Every time he neared me, I moved away. “Don’t use me anymore in your writing! Think for yourself,” I whispered.

He winced. I was sorry to hurt him.

“It wasn’t just you I wrote about, Miss Madeline. You are a representation of all the poor kids caught up in this mess!” he said.

“Kids? Kids? I’m no kid! Go away!”

“All right, maybe I did use you, but it was for my paper! My Yankee paper! Why did you pretend to not know me in the street, Miss Madeline? And who was that funny looking boy you were with?”

“Nobody! He . . . he is the son of my aunt’s friend.” Okay, that sounded stupid. “He’s someone I know. I was minding him while . . . It’s none of your business anyway!” I was trying to think fast, and it wasn’t working. Jake was too close to me. I moved away.

He grabbed my hand. “Madeline.” He said my name softly. So familiar, so—

“Just leave me alone,” I said weakly, meaning it and not meaning it. Oh boy, was I in a muddle.