Into the Whirlwind (31 page)

She’d forgotten to bring a handkerchief and tears streamed down her face, but the cuff of her blouse worked just as well. “All of us have gone through a terrible experience. I finally
understand what my father was speaking of.” She glanced at Charlie Frisch, the piano maker. “To my brothers in the piano factory and the vinegar distillery, please come to us as you need help with your new building. There is no reason watchmakers can’t do a little heavy lifting in the weeks ahead. And to the 57th . . . you are my heroes. And if I don’t quit talking, those children at the dessert table are going to have my head.”

Alice hustled her across the room, where a cake glowing with fifty-seven candles was waiting to be cut. Mollie did the honors, while Alice began filling mugs with warmed cider. With so many people to be served, Alice had cut small squares of the sturdy shipping boxes to serve as plates.

Sophie was first in line for a piece of cake. When Mollie handed her a slice, she looked at it skeptically. “I don’t like to eat off pasteboard.”

“Oh, Sophie, I’ll bet you’ve never tried it,” Mollie said as she pushed the piece of cake toward her. The girl had come a long way since the fire, when she’d demanded to be carried like a princess through the flames, but there was bound to be a little backsliding on occasion. As expected, Sophie took the cake and started happily gorging herself on it.

It took them a while to serve everyone, but the wave of exhilaration made her feel like she could do this for weeks and never get tired. She looked up to survey her wonderful new workshop, filled with friends and laughter and hope. Richard Lowe, standing beside the newly installed kiln, gazed at her with warm approval. Heat flushed her cheeks as she smiled at him.

She knew that today was the beginning of something wonderful.

A week after Frank Spencer’s death, a flat-bottomed schooner named the
City of the Century
had made its first appearance
in Chicago. Its arrival coincided with the disappearance of the
Marianne
, a schooner of the same size, grade, and ports of call.

It didn’t take Zack long to track down Ralph Coulter after he discovered this. Zack watched the
City of the Century
pull into the narrow slip that had been excavated into the bank of the lake, leading to miles of docking space in the timber yards. The timber yards swarmed with dozens of lumber shovers who scrambled to offload the logs into the waterway and prod them along the current and into the slips where the logs would be counted, sorted, and stacked. Zack spotted Ralph Coulter leaning over the railing of a walkway suspended over the rushing waters. The noise of the river and the bumping of the logs made it easy for him to approach without Ralph’s notice.

“Mr. Coulter!” Zack shouted in an artificially cheerful tone. The man whirled around. When he saw Zack at the end of the bridge, his face blanched white and he looked ready to bolt, but Zack blocked the only way off the suspended bridge. Zack didn’t want to trap the man, he just wanted to pump him for information. He strolled a little closer, holding his hands open in an easy manner. “Relax. I just want to chat.”

Coulter shot a nervous glance at the rushing waters below. With no avenue of escape, Coulter’s shoulders sagged and he directed Zack to the loading house. Zack trailed closely behind as he followed Coulter across the timber yard. It was cold enough to see their breath in the air inside the empty loading house, and Coulter was breathing heavily.

He was also adamant in asserting his innocence. “Look, I cleared out of the church because I didn’t want any trouble. I didn’t have anything to do with what happened to that man. I liked Frank Spencer.”

The bellow of a foghorn sounded from off the lake, startling Coulter, who mopped at the perspiration beading on his brow.
Zack didn’t mind applying a little pressure, which was why he didn’t want the golden presence of Richard Lowe with him today. He doubted Mollie’s fair-haired hero was quite as skilled in the delicate art of arm twisting.

“So you don’t know anything about three dozen gold watches? Strange, because they disappeared the same day you did.”

“I never saw any watches, I never
touched
any watches. I’ve been working in the lumber business since I was twelve years old. I wouldn’t even know what to do with a passel of fancy watches.”

Zack kept his face carefully neutral. “And how about Jesse? Has he been in the lumber business as long as you?”

Coulter’s eyes widened. “How do you know about Jesse?”

In the confusion of that night, both Mollie and Ulysses reported hearing Ralph Coulter shout out the name Jesse, but he obviously did not remember doing so. Zack saw no reason to enlighten him. Zack angled his chair so he could prop his booted feet up on a sawhorse, fiddling with the buttons on his vest. “My guess is that Jesse was never the sort to get up before sunrise to meet lumber schooners coming in from the north woods. Not the sort to begin saving for his first schooner at age twelve the way you did. People who filch things to earn a quick buck seldom are. What a shame if you were the only person left holding the bag on this one.”

“
I didn’t steal any watches
,” Coulter ground out from behind clenched teeth.

“Have you talked to a lawyer about this?” Zack asked casually. “Because I don’t think it matters if you stole the watches or not. Jesse knew there were watches in the church, and that means someone told him about it. Maybe it was just in casual conversation, maybe it was more calculating. Either way, if you were the one who told Jesse the people of the 57th were guarding
something valuable, and a man was killed as a result of that, that makes you an accomplice to the crime. You could hang for it.”

Ralph Coulter fixed him with a steady glare, the angry heat in his face so strong it looked as if it could ignite, but he made no move to offer any information. If this man was willing to take the blame rather than roll over on Jesse, it was likely Jesse was a family member, probably a brother. Zack rolled the dice. Whipping his feet off the sawhorse, Zack planted them on the floor and leaned closer to Coulter.

“The thing is, your mother was always proudest of you,” Zack asserted. “You were the one who worked hard to earn an honest dollar. Who made sure the family never went hungry and paid the bill when the doctor needed to be called. How would she feel if you were locked up in prison trying to save Jesse’s hide? Jesse will come to a bad end sooner or later, and what a shame that your family will be left with no one to make sure they have heating oil in the winter.” He glanced out the window, crusted over with a layer of frost. “And it looks like we’re in store for a cold one this year.”

Coulter swiped his brow again and then twisted the handkerchief in his hands so tightly his knuckles went white. Zack didn’t move a muscle as he watched Coulter wrestle with his conscience. Outside, the steady splashes and thumps from logs tumbling into the slips carried on while Zack held his breath.

Finally Coulter looked up to meet his eyes. “Jesse is long gone, but I might know where he is. I
might
. But here is the thing. My brother has two boys, and they mean the world to me. I’m not going to see them wind up homeless orphans.”

“How old are the boys?”

“One is nine, the other six.” Coulter folded his arms across his chest, leaned back in his chair, and glared at Zack as he continued talking. “I am not a rich man, but I can provide a
home for the boys.” He gave a bitter laugh. “They live with me more often than not anyway. But I can’t give them the best of everything.”

“Neither can I,” Zack said. “Don’t get carried away here, Coulter. Give me a reasonable request, and I’ll see what I can do.”

“I’ve heard about you,” Coulter said. “I know you came out of nowhere and then pulled strings to get into Yale. I want the same for the boys. Both of them.”

Zack’s eyes narrowed. He didn’t have those kinds of connections, and even if he did, he wouldn’t squander them on a man he already had over a barrel.

Mollie’s face rose in his mind, her eyes two blue pools of grief.
Frank Spencer was a second father to me
, she had said in an aching voice. There was a wide swath of pain Mollie kept hidden, and it was tormenting her with nightmares that put shadows under her eyes. He could solve it for her. He could give her the peace of knowing Frank’s murderers had paid for their deed. He stared at the sawdust on the floor, his brain sifting through his options, connections, and favors still to be called in.

“I can’t get those boys into Yale, but I have connections at Notre Dame. Will that work?”

There was a minuscule easing of the lines on Coulter’s forehead. “That will work. I want it in writing. And I want immunity from what happened in the church that night. Signed by a judge.”

Zack gave a hollow laugh. “It sounds like you’ve already been to a lawyer,” he said cynically.

“I’m no fool,” Coulter said.

It took Zack two days to get the necessary documents in order. Coulter’s attorney relayed the entire story. After the fire, Coulter paid regular visits to his mother and brother’s family where they
had taken shelter in the basement of a woolen mill with dozens of other burned-out refugees. When Coulter’s mother asked if they would be better off moving to the church, Coulter said they wouldn’t, telling her there was no roof, few provisions, and a spoiled little girl who made everyone miserable. He said most of them would probably leave soon, because they had recently come into possession of a bag of gold watches and would surely use them to purchase better accommodations for themselves soon. It was an innocent comment, but enough to set Jesse Coulter and a gang of thugs on the hunt.

The meeting took place in the book-lined office of Coulter’s lawyer. In addition to the paper work signed by a judge, Zack brought Colonel Lowe to attend the meeting. It was likely they were going to need the manpower of the 57th in order to round up the entire load of criminals who had descended on the church that night, and as much as he hated it, he still needed Colonel Lowe’s help.

Colonel Lowe looked like he smelled rotting fish as he glared at Coulter across the smooth surface of the walnut table. “Why are we rewarding this man?” he demanded. “His foolish talk led to the death of Frank Spencer.”

Zack wanted to lunge across the table and shove a sock down Colonel Lowe’s throat. Ralph Coulter already looked nervous enough to bolt from the room, and this sort of antagonism could scuttle the deal before Coulter talked. Zack forced his voice to be neutral. “I’m sending two boys to college. I hope you don’t have a problem with that.”

“I have a problem with anything that turns a blind eye to justice,” Colonel Lowe said.

Which was why Colonel Lowe was probably a better match for Mollie, after all. Mollie liked safety and security. Her fair-haired hero could give it to her without ever having to stray from
his comfortable world of black and white ethics. Neither Zack nor Ralph Coulter had ever had such a luxury.

When the papers were signed and notarized, all eyes turned to Ralph Coulter, who looked ready to weep. He knew his next words might condemn his brother to death by a hangman’s noose, but it would be a greater evil to allow Jesse Coulter’s rampant crime spree to continue unabated. Or to allow Jesse to influence the lives of his two young boys, who might be set on the proper path if raised by a decent man.

Coulter buried his face in his hands, his voice so soft it could barely be heard. “You should look in Milwaukee,” he said. And over the next twenty minutes, as a man turned his own brother over to the law, Zack thanked God he had never been painted into such a stark corner.

After the meeting, Zack stood in the doorway and watched Ralph Coulter walk down the street, beaten and defeated.

“There walks away a sorry excuse for a man,” Colonel Lowe said.

That night, Zack stepped inside a church. Normally he lit a candle for the safety of his father hauling grain off the docks, or for his mother’s insane quest to single-handedly rescue the nation of Poland. This evening, after he tipped a coin into the donation box and sank to his knees, Zack lit a candle and said a prayer for Ralph Coulter.