The Widow's Secret (13 page)

And for the first time in a decade, Jocelyn felt something other than anger toward the Almighty.

Slowly Micah's tender ministrations stilled, until the two of them stood together in a little pool of silence, surrounded by loud conversations, milling crowds, clattering hooves and the teeth-rattling noise of trains shuddering along the tracks above them.

“Jocelyn…” His head dipped. Then he froze, stepped back, jerking his hands away to cram them inside his pockets. He gave her a crooked grin. “I'm afraid I lost my head a little, seeing that oaf manhandle you. At least this is the Bowery. If I kissed you, which I want to with every breath in my body, instead of arresting us for lewdness, an appreciative audience would applaud.”

“They might even toss coins in your hat.”

“As long as they aren't counterfeit.”

Before she lost her courage, Jocelyn stepped close, then stood on tiptoe to brush a kiss against one hard cheekbone. “Thank you for saving me,” she whispered. “I'm sorry for causing a scene.”

“Not your fault. I'm sorry I wasn't with you. There wouldn't have been a scene.”

Abruptly, his smile vanished. Eyes narrowed, he began a methodical visual search, memorizing, Jocelyn knew, every face that glanced their way. She watched his face harden to a stone mask.

She turned toward the café, where several customers, including Mr. Limbrick, had gathered at the window.

T
he room was dark save for the gas flame softly hissing in a wall sconce. Near a curtained window, the man sat shrouded in shadow, his face a pale blur. Somewhere in the room a clock ticked off the seconds in a monotonous rhythm.

In his hand the man held a single sheet of paper torn from an inexpensive tablet. He had read the hurriedly scrawled words twice now, his mouth set. Finally, with a foul curse he crumpled the paper, threw it to the floor, then downed his glass of whiskey in a single gulp.

After a while he stood, walked over to the crumpled note and picked it up. Each movement deliberate, he struck a match and touched the small flame to the paper. For a moment he watched the edges curl, brown, then softly ignite in a red-gold blaze.
Like her hair
, he thought viciously.

Just before the heat singed his fingers, he dropped the burning remains onto the marble hearth of the unused fireplace, ground the ashes beneath his heel and strode from the room.

 

Micah stared out the window of Maisie Tanner's cottage, one hand resting on the sill, the other absently rubbing
beneath his chin. Beard stubble scratched his fingertips; he needed a shave. Gusts of wind had persisted into the twilight, whistling through windowpanes and rattling shutters. A leafless tree in Mrs. Tanner's minuscule backyard swayed with the breeze; through the cobweb of its branches, Micah watched the gray sky turn dark and bleak.

“But you don't know for sure that this man recognized you,” Jonathan Tanner pointed out, not for the first time. He glanced down at the report in his hand. “From what you wrote here, the patrons inside the café, one of whom included Limbrick, were looking out the window, at you and Mrs. Bingham. But that doesn't mean he recognized either of you. Yes, in a crowd Mrs. Bingham's remarkable, but she is not the only redhead strolling the streets.” He laughed. “New York is crawling with immigrants, several million of them Irish, or even Scots. A fair number of them have red hair.”

“No other woman's hair compares to Jocelyn's.” Micah leaned his forehead against the window, his thoughts as dour as the twilight. “I shouldn't have allowed her to go back to the Brocks',” he said, also not for the first time. “We can't forget Benny. We still don't know where he is, don't know for sure what he knows or what he plans to do with what he knows. However, Benny's not a murderer. If he confesses that he passed that evidence to Jocelyn at the store where Hepplewhite was murdered, he might wind up murdered himself. So I'm thinking—” praying fervently “—that Benny's kept his mouth shut, or scarpered altogether.” A sick feeling swam sluggishly in his gut, and not even Jonathan's insightful observations assuaged it. Ruthlessly Micah forced his attention on what they must do next, instead of dwelling on what was already done. “The Brocks have spies everywhere. I don't know all of them by sight, any more than you do. But today I was confident we'd given them the slip—until that ill-
timed scuffle in the Bowery. I'd like to believe we weren't picked up on the trip back to the Brocks', but with all the crowds, I can't be certain.”

“Well, I have it on good authority that I'm worth at least half a dozen spies, sir.” The assistant tucked Micah's handwritten report along with his own typewritten notes into the Secret Service envelope he would mail in the evening post. His movements were as pedantic as those of a fussy schoolmarm, though put Jon Tanner down on the docks and the lean but well-muscled young man would pass for a navvy. “If you're that concerned for Mrs. Bingham, let me take over for Mr. MacKay. I wouldn't be around to bail you out of trouble, but I could rescue the damsel in distress.”

“Your humility is reassuring.” Micah turned away from the window to study the younger man. The tough arrogance of youth might still dust his spirit, but if Micah could choose one man other than Alexander MacKay to guard his or Jocelyn's back, despite his youth it would be Jonathan Tanner. “Still fancy being a professional boxer when you grow up, instead of an operative? From the look of them the shoulder seams on that suit are begging for mercy.”

Unoffended, Jonathan assumed a boxing stance and delivered several rapid punches to the air. “Haven't ripped them yet,” he announced with a grin. “Give me another month. As for what I want to do with my life…I don't know how to answer. Sometimes I can see myself as the next Gentleman Jim, but then I think about what you're doing. And I feel, well, selfish. Vainglorious, as Aunt Maisie calls it. I know I shouldn't waste the best years of my life in the ring, but I can't see myself spending them hunched over a desk, writing reports, either.”

“What are you now? Twenty-four? Five?”

“Twenty-seven. You've been too busy falling in love with Mrs. Bingham to notice, I imagine.”

At twenty-seven, Micah had already buried a wife and son. His faith in God, and his dedication to the Secret Service, had saved his sanity. At twenty-seven, he'd felt as old as Moses. Now he was prattling about Jocelyn's hair, fretting over her safety, as though he were a calf-eyed sprout half Jonathan's age. Abruptly, he reached a decision. “I'm not so busy I can't add sums and come up with the correct answer. Regardless of evidence or the lack thereof, I'm removing Mrs. Bingham from this case by the end of the week. In my judgment the danger to her life outweighs her usefulness, however critical it may be. I'm going to send Chief Hazen a telegram. I'll write out what to say, but we'll maintain established protocols and let you send it.” From the outset of this phase in the investigation, they'd agreed Micah could not risk visiting places a wealthy businessman would not normally be seen, which included frequent jaunts to Western Union.

“Tonight?”

“Tonight.” Micah strode out of Mrs. Tanner's fussy little parlor down a narrow hall that led to Jonathan's room. Jonathan had persuaded his aunt to donate the use of her deceased husband's old rolltop desk—which could be locked—and soon after their arrival in New York, he and Micah maneuvered it into the privacy of Jonathan's bedroom.

“Your aunt will be home from her quilting bee by seven, you told me,” he said after they'd closed and locked the door. “That gives us almost an hour.”

“Why not pull Mrs. Bingham out now, instead of sending off a telegram?”

He'd thought about it. Yessir, he'd thought about it long and hard. “Because we're close enough to spit in their faces, but not close enough to handcuff 'em. She should be safe for another day or two, because I've been invited for dinner there tomorrow night. As I explained to Mrs. Bingham, they won't
risk forging a note, claiming illness or some other trumped-up reason for her not appearing.”

“Because you wouldn't accept it, and ask…ah…pointed questions.”

“Precisely.” He added reluctantly, “On this end, however, I'm thinking it might be wise for you to use a telegraph office in another borough.”

“Don't worry about me, Mr. MacKenzie,” he claimed with an insouciant grin. “Remember, I know how to be invisible. Besides, I can be to the Western Union in Queens in a quarter of an hour, sir.”

Grappling with a vague disquietude, Micah opened his mouth to make the suggestion an order, but hesitated. Jonathan needed to grow, needed to test his own skills as a trained operative, instead of following orders as Micah's assistant.
To become a man,
his father used to tell him,
you have to be given the opportunity to live with the consequences of your choices.

Jonathan unlocked the desk, rolled back the top, and from one of the slots deftly removed an unused telegram. “I'm ready whenever you are, sir.”

While Micah talked to his assistant, he simultaneously prayed that the choices he had made were not about to reap disastrous consequences.

 

After crossing the river, Micah alternated hansoms, two horsecars and a streetcar with four stops along the Third Avenue El, eventually wending his way back to the Brevoort Hotel. A little past ten o'clock he strolled into the lobby, whistling as though he hadn't a care in the world. No strangers loitered in the public rooms, nor were any messages waiting. The desk clerk was the usual man, as were the bellhops who stood at attention and greeted him as he strode
to the elevator. Hamish, the elderly elevator operator, assured him that no new guests had arrived that evening.

Marginally relieved, a few moments later Micah unlocked the door to his room and stepped inside, his gaze automatically sweeping the area. He had time only to notice the billowing curtains that covered the windows when he sensed movement in the shadows off to his left.

Even as he ducked and spun, something hard slammed against the back of his head. Lights exploded inside his skull before he hurtled into darkness.

 

Pleading fatigue from hers and Micah's extended outing, Jocelyn told her aunt and uncle she would not be joining them for dinner at the Waldorf Hotel. Their protests only hardened her resolve, though Mr. Bingham's disappointment stung her conscience, and her cousins surprised her with their sincerity. “You're the only woman I know with a brain,” Virgil complained. Julius gave her a hangdog expression and mumbled that at least she never made sport of him. “Who else will I talk to?”

After they finally left, with Portia's glacial disapproval still frosting the air, Jocelyn requested a supper tray and retreated to her room. She longed to eat in blissful silence, but Katya filled her tablet with questions and accusations and portents.

“Katya, please don't badger me,” Jocelyn protested finally, torn between anger and tears. “Things have happened. I need to think.”

Not thinking when Borcks not know where are you and Mr. MacKenzie all day.

“Katya.” Jocelyn gestured silently toward the pair of ladies' chairs in front of windows that overlooked the garden, where she and the maid sat every evening. The nook was also on the opposite side of the room from the door to the outside
hall, so not even a servant with ears the size of an elephant would be able to overhear.

“You must listen to me,” she told Katya after they sat down. “Listen, and not interrupt until I'm through.”

The maid sucked in her cheeks, but after a moment she gave a stiff nod.

“Last night, I couldn't sleep. I went for a walk in the garden. And I saw the man Mr. MacKenzie has been searching for all these months. The one who was in Mr. Hepplewhite's store that day.”

Katya's eyes flooded with alarm, and a quiver shuddered through her sturdy frame.

“Seeing this man proves we were right—you and I—to come to New York. It means we can finally do something to help, Katya. I needed to tell Mr. MacKenzie, but I couldn't risk sharing this information where the Brock servants—including the coachman—could overhear. That's why we were gone for so long.”

Unbidden, the events of the day crashed around her; she fought to maintain a level tone of voice. “The man's name is Benny. Benny Foggarty. Remember it, but don't ever write it down in this house.” Through lips that felt like India rubber, she spelled the name out to help Katya remember it. “Can you see it inside your head?” she asked. The girl nodded. “He may or may not have recognized me,” Jocelyn plowed ahead, “but I'm more afraid Micah might be in danger.”

The sensation of panic intensified. Jocelyn closed her eyes and tried to imagine her favorite oak tree, but all her jumbled mind conjured up was the image of Micah's face when they'd parted earlier. In the late-afternoon light, the strong bones appeared more finely drawn, the gray eyes dull as soot. He hadn't wanted to leave her. Jocelyn insisted. Their parting had been awkward, the air rife with unspoken currents.

An internal nudge, like a puff of wind blowing against the locked door inside her heart, somehow discovered a crack and before she quite realized it Jocelyn found herself praying. Begging God to keep him safe.

Not for me, but for Micah. You took his wife and his son. Don't let anything happen to
him
now.
Surely divine justice as well as divine mercy would acknowledge the legitimacy of her plea. And perhaps since the prayer was not self-serving, it would engender a response.

Katya tugged her sleeve, and with a tremulous sigh Jocelyn opened her eyes.

What do we should do?

A lump formed in Jocelyn's throat. “We're going to do whatever we have to, in order to protect him. The Brocks are out for at least another three hours. With a little bit of luck and—” swallowing the lump, she added in a rusty whisper “—with a little bit of prayer, we'll…do our part.”

She cleared her throat, for the first time catching a glimmer of understanding for how Micah must have felt. “We have the perfect opportunity to engage in a bit of sleuthing. Let me think. Um…I need you to watch and listen,” she began, struggling to organize her thoughts. “Stand guard outside doors. If you hear anyone, you let me know so we can scoot away before we're caught in suspicious circumstances.”

A thunderous frown etched across the broad forehead.
Not good plan. I can not talk. Can not run fast. Mr. MacKenzie won't like.

“Well, it's the only plan I can think of. I have to do something. Mr. MacKenzie needs proof. This is the first time in a month I've had the opportunity to search with minimal risk.” Jocelyn stood. “If you'd rather stay here in the room, fine. I'm not a trained operative, so certainly I'm not making this an order.” Turning, she headed for the huge closet. “Time is
passing. I need to change out of this lounging wrapper and put on more suitable clothes, something a thief would wear.”

Darts of self-loathing swooped about like a flock of ravens as she tore off the wrapper, flinging it in a graceless heap onto a padded bench. No wonder Katya was repelled by Jocelyn's suggestion. What decent soul would embrace the notion of pilfering through someone else's private sanctuaries? Her face felt hot as she recalled her childish prayer. God was good, perfect. If He hadn't deigned to answer her prayers through all the years when she had tried to please Him, what on earth made her think He would respond to petitions from a woman who had become a sneak as well as a liar?