Bloody Lessons: A Victorian San Francisco Mystery

by Locke, M. Louisa

Now that it was three in the afternoon and the school day had ended, all she needed to do was meet briefly with Della Thorndike, then join Jamie on the front steps of the school to wait for his mother, and they would head home. Home to figure out how to survive the next hours until she could return to work, where for whole minutes at a time she didn’t think about anything but the tasks at hand. Didn’t think about what it meant that Hattie had been pregnant and that a miscarriage caused her death. Didn’t think of her friend lying on a dark cold landing, bleeding to death, all alone.

  “Miss Dawson, do you have any particular instructions for grading the map assignment?” Kitty Blaine asked.

  Laura found herself staring at the young redheaded practice teacher, having forgotten momentarily that she wasn’t alone in the classroom. Kitty had been standing at the door to the hall, making sure that the students remembered all their scarves and caps as they jostled their way to freedom.

  She summoned forth a smile. “Not really, Miss Blaine. Since there are fifty questions, give them each two points. If you judge that they have gotten a partial answer correct, give them one point. I will go over the papers tomorrow and record the grades, and if there are any problems, we can discuss them then.”

  “Thank you, Miss. I hope I won’t disappoint,” Kitty said softly. “Do you need anything else of me before I go?”

  Handing over the pile of map tests, Laura said, “I am sure you will do just fine. I can’t think of anything we didn’t go over at noon. I see no reason you can’t leave now, unless you think you should attend my meeting with Miss Thorndike.”

  “Oh, no,” Kitty said quickly. “I mean, I spoke to her this morning before I came over to Clement. She didn’t say anything about seeing me this afternoon.”

  Laura noted the odd defensiveness behind this last statement, and she responded firmly, “Then I assume she won’t expect you to be there. I will see you tomorrow, Miss Blaine. Have a pleasant evening.”

  As she watched Kitty move quickly to the back of the room to fetch an expensive dark green cashmere cloak from one of the hooks, Laura puzzled over what to make of the young woman. All week, Kitty had been extremely deferential when she talked to Laura, barely speaking above a whisper, keeping her emerald green eyes cast down and her hands clasped firmly in her lap, making it easy to believe Della’s description of her as shy and socially awkward. But she appeared entirely confident and quite at ease when she interacted with the boys and girls in the class, already a clear favorite with them after only four days. Laura wondered if the shyness and deference was an act. Hattie always said…

  All the dark thoughts she had been holding off came crowding in, and Laura felt the tears rise, ready to spill over. No. Not here. Not now. She took a deep breath and stood up, gathering the last of her books and papers into her satchel and getting her own cloak and hat, not intending to come back to the room after her meeting with Della. The weather had turned nasty this morning, and most of the day, rain drops had splattered against the classroom windows. Nevertheless, she could see that the sun shone weakly on the southwestern side of the houses across from the school, so they probably wouldn’t need the umbrella that Barbara Hewitt had brought with her this morning.

  As she walked down the hall, she nodded at the janitor, Mr. Ferguson, a wiry older man who was vigorously scrubbing at a spot on the wall that some boy’s grubby hand had created. She then stopped and stuck her head into Miss Chesterton’s fifth grade classroom, where, as usual, Jamie was helping clean the board. She said, “Good afternoon, Miss Chesterton. Jamie, I will be about twenty minutes; I have a meeting in the teachers’ room. When you are done helping Miss Chesterton, wait for me by the front door. If your mother gets there before I do, come get me, won’t you?”

  When she got to the first floor, she saw Della Thorndike standing with Kitty just inside the building’s entrance. The tableau, the tall stately Miss Thorndike speaking animatedly to the petite Kitty, who was staring down at her feet, looked for all the world like a mother scolding a sullen child. Della noticed Laura and stepped back from Kitty, who hurriedly made her way out of the building, no doubt for her waiting carriage. No walking or taking the local horsecar home for Miss Kitty.

  “Laura, I am so glad to see you. I hope that Kitty has been behaving herself.” Della warmly shook Laura’s hand. “Do let’s have a cup of tea and tell me how your first week of supervising one of my students has gone,” she continued, taking Laura’s arm and walking her quickly to the teachers’ room.

  When Laura indicated that she didn’t have much time before she would have to leave, Della got right down to business, taking her over to two chairs in the corner of the room where they wouldn’t be disturbed by the other teachers coming in and out. Laura spent a few minutes recounting the main outlines of the lessons she had covered during the week and her decision to let Kitty grade the short map test she had given today.

  Della praised her warmly for how clearly she had organized the progression of subjects, and Laura felt comfortable enough to ask her opinion on how to handle one of the girls whose spelling remained very erratic. “She seems quite bright. The essays she writes are well-organized, and her grammar is correct. Yet she keeps switching letters, sometimes so badly it takes awhile for me to realize what word she intended to write. When I point out the errors to her, she becomes visibly upset. Hattie said she had tried…”

  Laura’s throat closed, and she stopped speaking.

  Della stared at her and was just starting to say something when Andrew Russell appeared suddenly in front of them. Standing there, wearing a black armband around his left sleeve, his eyes red-rimmed behind his glasses, he destroyed the fragile equilibrium Laura had worked to maintain all day. He bowed to Della, who had stood up at his approach, and said, “Miss Thorndike, could you please spare a moment for me to speak with Miss Dawson privately?”

  Before Laura could object, Della nodded and went across the room to chat with one of the teachers who was checking her mailbox. Laura stood up, her heart beating rapidly enough that she could feel the blood surging through her temples. What did he want with her? Did he really want to speak to her in this public place? Whatever his plans, she would not give him the satisfaction of losing her composure as she had at the hospital.

  “Miss Dawson,” Russell said stiffly. “Hattie’s…Miss Wilks’ parents arrived in town this afternoon. They asked me to tell you that they will be taking their daughter…taking Hattie…” Here his voice broke, and Laura found herself throwing up her hands as if she could stop him from continuing, stop him from uttering Hattie’s name.

  Russell began to speak more quickly. “They are taking her back home with them tomorrow morning. They asked if you would be willing to go to her boarding house. Pack up her trunk. Have it shipped home. They would consider it a great favor if you would do this.”

  Laura had never met Hattie’s parents. Hattie had loved them, but they didn’t understand why she wasn’t content to stay in Santa Barbara and marry one of the local farmers she’d grown up with. Hattie had laughed and said they were afraid something would happen to her if she went off to the big city. But something bad had happened. Something terrible.

  “Please, Miss Dawson,” Russell went on, his voice stronger. “I have a personal request as well. I know that Hattie kept my letters, and I would appreciate it greatly if you could return them to me. While there isn’t anything in them that I am ashamed of, I believe she would prefer that her parents not…”

  “Not know how you took her innocence and ruined her life?” Laura spat at him, her anger overpowering her resolve to say nothing to this man who had ruined her life as well.

  Russell stepped back as if she had physically struck him. Before he could respond, Della Thorndike hurried over. Placing her hand on his shoulder, she said, “Andrew, Mr. Russell, whatever is the matter?” Not getting an answer, she then turned to Laura. “Please, tell me. Why is poor Mr. Russell wearing mourning? Who has died?”

  Laura, feeling
she couldn’t bear to hear Della’s cries of sympathy directed at poor Mr. Russell, muttered an excuse and fled into the hallway, never more glad to see Jamie and his mother standing in the vestibule waiting for her.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Saturday afternoon, January 17, 1880

  "MOST WONDERFUL CLAIRVOYANT––Tells everything without question." ––San Francisco Chronicle, 1880

  Annie’s morning wasn’t progressing well. The sleep she’d lost the past three nights was finally catching up with her. Not only had she stayed awake all Wednesday night watching over Laura but she found herself unable to go to sleep the next two nights until well after midnight. This was when the squeak of bedsprings from the next room told her Nate’s sister had finally retired to bed. Consequently, her morning’s work as Madam Sibyl had suffered. Despite the preparation she did before seeing each client––one of the reasons for Madam Sibyl’s “by appointment only” policy––she often had to make snap judgments about whether or not to dissuade her male clients from acting on the latest “tip” they got from their barber, brother-in-law, or bar-room buddy. Usually, her financial expertise and experience helped her respond quickly and confidently, but today her brain felt like it was filled with over-cooked oatmeal. She feared she may have steered Mr. Hackett in the wrong direction when he asked about the new stock offerings by the California Electric Light Company, and Mr. Watkins had gotten very huffy when she said his astrological reading indicated that he should invest in the new Inglenook winery that Captain Neibaum was starting up the valley. She had forgotten Watkins was an abstainer from all things alcohol.

  Removing her wig, she told herself that the waiting list of people who were anxious to pay the two dollars she charged for an appointment meant that if these mistakes cost her some business, she would still be all right. Yet the years she had spent without a cent to her name, dependent on the not-very-kind charity of her former in-laws, had ingrained in her a level of anxiety that never quite went away. It kept her from moving forward in her plans to shed the Madam Sibyl charade and see if she could still support herself as plain, non-clairvoyant Mrs. Annie Fuller, financial advisor.

  Looking at the dark circles that appeared under her eyes as she removed the powder from her face, she wondered if she could find time for a short rest this afternoon. She didn’t want to look quite so wrung out if Nate was able to make it this evening. He tended to get protective when he thought she was overdoing, and her tears Thursday morning had already produced a worried note from him in the mail yesterday.

  Ever since Hattie’s death, she hadn’t been able to stop thinking about her own miscarriage. Something she had avoided doing for years. Last year, when she was giving advice to Ruthann Hazelton, she’d never thought to connect that woman’s troubles with her own past. But a strange little girl she’d encountered this past fall and the recent experience of holding Ruthann’s baby, Lillian, in her arms had started her thinking about that past and her lost chance at motherhood.

  She wondered if Hattie had kept her condition secret from her fiancé, Russell, the way Annie had from John. What if Laura was completely wrong? What if Hattie had been upset, not because she didn’t really want to marry Russell but because she was terrified he wouldn’t marry her, leaving her to raise a child on her own, her reputation ruined? If so, might she have flung herself down the stairs in a desperate attempt to end the pregnancy? Once, early in her own pregnancy, Annie had contemplated doing something similar when her husband had been particularly brutal. Only for a moment. But she’d never completely let go of the guilty fear that her own miscarriage had happened because she hadn’t fully wanted the child.

  Burying her head in her hands, Annie whispered to herself, “What if that was my last chance to be a mother, and I threw it away?”

  “Ma’am, are you all right? You’re not coming down sick, are you?” Her maid Kathleen stood frowning in the doorway between the small study and Madam Sibyl’s parlor.

  Annie sat up and gave her face an unnecessary scrub with the towel so she could regain her composure. She then said, “Yes, Kathleen, I am quite well. I am just feeling tired. I have promised myself a nap once I have eaten. Are the plans still on for the excursion to Woodward’s Gardens?”

  As she had intended, this change in subject diverted Kathleen, who moved into the room, her voice lowering into a confidential whisper. “Yes, ma’am. This morning, I asked Miss Dawson if she would be willing to come with me and Patrick this afternoon.”

  “And she agreed to go?”

  “Well, I hinted that she would be doing me a great favor. Told her about how we’d promised Jamie and Ian we’d take them along but how I was worried that watching after two such lively lads could put a crimp in me and Patrick’s time together.”

  Annie chuckled, knowing very well that Kathleen often invited her youngest brother, Ian, to come with her on those afternoons off with her beau, Patrick McGee, just so she could keep him at arm’s length. Patrick, with his freckles and unruly copper hair, always struck Annie as a boy himself, but she knew he was also good-hearted, dependable, and very much in love with Kathleen, who had confessed last week that she was afraid Patrick was working himself up to “pop the question.” At the time, Kathleen had told her, “Not that I’m not partial to him. But I gotta think about Ian. I say yes to Patrick, and before you know it, he’d be nagging at me to set the date, we’d be hitched, and I’d have a passel of my own young’uns. On what, a beat cop’s wages? No. I’m going to make sure Ian stays in school, makes something of himself. Then’s the time I can start thinking on having my own family.”

  This memory had the distressing potential to drag Annie back to her dark thoughts, so she stood up briskly and asked, “How did Miss Laura seem this morning?”

  “I’m sorry to say she didn’t look like she got much rest. Sorta like yourself, if you don’t mind me saying so, ma’am. I think the fresh air will do her good, put some roses in those cheeks. Sure you don’t want to come with us?” Kathleen picked up the shawl Annie had carelessly dropped on the floor and removed all signs of powder from it before draping it neatly back over the chair.

  “Oh Kathleen, you completely undermine my confidence. Mr. Dawson is coming this evening, and now you tell me I look like a hag!”

  “Now ma’am, he’d not notice if you grew warts on your nose and hairs on your chin, he’s that smitten with you.”

  Annie smiled, marveling over how this wise young girl could always lift her spirits.

  *****

  Following Kathleen down into the kitchen, Annie surveyed the room with pleasure. The kitchen, the heart of the house, was of ample size. Its southern-facing windows over the sink got the full force of the winter sun, and today those windows were open because the rain of yesterday had cleared the skies of the usual grey clouds and fog. What a lovely reminder that the San Francisco peninsula, wedged between the Pacific and the Bay, could produce such warm, spring-like days in late January. A perfect day to ramble around the grounds of Woodward’s Gardens. She was sorely tempted to change her mind and go with the group.

  Then she noticed Laura standing near the back door with Barbara, Jamie, and Kathleen’s youngest brother, Ian, while they tried to get Dandy to stand up on his hind legs. Ian, already ten and in the sixth grade, was small-boned like Kathleen, with black untidy hair and a twinkle of mischief in his dark blue eyes. Jamie was sturdier, with light-brown hair and brown eyes, and although he was a year younger than Ian, he had recently gone through a growth spurt. As a result, when he draped his arm around the other boy’s shoulders, Annie could see they were of nearly identical height. The two boys had met at the boarding house Halloween party last fall and had become fast friends, much to the mutual delight of Kathleen and Jamie’s mother.

  When she saw Laura smile as the black-and-white terrier did his little dance, trying to stay on his back legs, she knew it would be best if she didn’t go to the Gardens. Laura would find it easier to forget recent events, if only for a litt
le time, if Annie didn’t tag along. She cared more deeply about what was best for the young woman than she’d ever thought possible. In the past, when Nate would tell her stories about Laura, she had blithely imagined what it would be like to have her as a sister-in-law. They would trade secrets, conspire against Nate, teasing him unmercifully, and Annie would provide Laura the advice that was always easier to get from someone other than your parents. What she never expected was the way her heart had expanded and embraced the young woman as she watched over her on Wednesday night.

  “Kathleen, dearie, you’ll be late if you don’t get moving,” Beatrice O’Rourke said, rapidly filling up a basket with sandwiches, apples, and what looked to Annie like a whole chocolate cake. “Lovely day like today, the cars to the Gardens will be terrible crowded.”

  With a shout, the boys announced Patrick’s arrival at the back door. Barbara Hewitt leaned down and scooped up Dandy, who was adding excited yips to the boys' welcome of the young policeman. Patrick good-naturedly withstood a pummeling by Ian and Jamie, then came into the kitchen and bowed first to Laura and then to Annie. Next, he went over to his aunt and simultaneously kissed her on the cheek and snagged the food basket from her, following Kathleen and Laura as they shooed the boys out the kitchen door.

  When the door shut behind them, it was as if all the sunlight and warmth of the day was snuffed out. A profound exhaustion settled over Annie.

  Beatrice O’Rourke came up to her and took her face in her plump but calloused hands and said kindly, “Annie, dear, sit yourself down in the old rocker for a bit of peace and quiet while I fix you a plate. Then I want you to tell me just exactly what happened to Miss Laura’s friend and why’s it got you so riled up.” She gave Annie a gentle pat on her cheek. “And don’t go pretending you don’t know what I’m talking about. Weeping into Mr. Dawson’s shoulder t’other day and circles under your eyes so dark you’d think someone gave you a round-house punch. Somethin’s wrong, and you’re not leaving my kitchen until you’ve confessed all.”