Beloved and Unseemly

by K. B. Owen

  Charlotte glanced back. “No, my office is in the other wing. That must be Miss Kimble.”

  Ruby shook her head. “The ten o’clock rule wouldn’t be a bad idea for the staff.”

  Charlotte shivered and closed the door with a quiet click. “Mr. Sanbourne is up late as well. When I came through the gate, I noticed the lights were still on in his laboratory.” She hung up her jacket and turned toward the stairs.

  “Afore you go to bed, Miss Wells wanted a word,” Ruby said.

  Charlotte raised an eyebrow. “At this hour?”

  “That’s what she said.”

  Charlotte tapped on Concordia’s door. No response.

  Ruby shrugged. “Ah well, she must a’ fallen asleep. Tomorrow will do, I’m sure.”

  Charlotte nodded. “Good night, Ruby.”

  “G’night.”

  Concordia had the strangest dream. She was roaming through a corridor lined on both sides with horse stalls, some occupied, some empty. For some reason, she was compelled to stop and examine every stall, though she had no idea what she was searching for. Sometimes a person rather than a horse would be standing in the stall: Mr. Langdon, Miss Pomeroy, Miss Kimble, Miss Banning. In one stall was a canvas propped on an easel. It was the caricature of Charlotte, Maynard, and Miss Kimble that she had seen at the Halloween ball. At the far end of the corridor, Peter Sanbourne was working a forge, which produced a great deal of smoke. It was getting harder and harder to see. Concordia was obliged to grope her way along, squinting in the haze.

  She awoke, coughing, to a smoky room.

  This was no dream.

  She sprung out of her chair. “F-fire!” She cracked open her door. Smoke billowed in.

  She snatched up a shawl and put it to her nose and mouth and made a run for the stairs. The smoke was thicker up here, and in the darkness she could barely make out a glow at the end of the hall.

  “Girls, girls, wake up!” she yelled, flinging open doors and hauling bodies out of beds. She heard Ruby run up the stairs behind her and roust the students on the other side of the corridor.

  With a collective shriek, the students jumped out of bed, grabbing at belongings.

  “No! There is no time—just get out!” She struggled to voice the words between fits of coughing.

  Ruby waved the girls down the stairs and started counting heads. “We’re missing...five!” she screamed.

  There were three doors at the end of the hall, two on the left and one on the right, where the heat was most intense. Concordia and Ruby grabbed ewers from the rooms and threw all the water they had at the fire. It created more smoke without making any difference.

  In the distance came the frantic clanging of the fire bell from Engine Company Seven, half a mile away at Main and Capen Streets. She heard Edward Langdon’s voice outside. “Concordia! Ruby! You have to get out!”

  Concordia pushed open a window and stuck her head out, inhaling blessed, cool air. The wind was as brisk as ever. “We have five more, at the far end of the hall!” she called.

  Langdon, in bathrobe and slippers with a nightcap still clapped to his head, cupped his hands around his mouth to be heard over the roar of flames, wind, and alarm bells. “We’re getting a ladder for them! You must come down!”

  “He’s right, miss, we have to go,” Ruby said, rubbing her eyes. “The fire’s right in front of their doors! We’ll never get past.”

  “Ruby, you go. After all, someone has to keep the girls outside from succumbing to hysterics.”

  Ruby gave a wan smile. “I think that ship has sailed already. Don’t wait too long.” She gave Concordia’s hand a squeeze and hurried down the stairs.

  Concordia stuck her head back out the window. “The others must be unconscious from the smoke,” she called to Langdon. “I will try to rouse them.” If she had voice enough. Her throat was raw already. “Do you have a second ladder? Miss Crandall’s room is on the other side.”

  “No!” Langdon called back. “We’ll have to wait for the firemen to get her!”

  Concordia’s stomach lurched. It might be too late. But if they rescued Charlotte first, there would be no time to save the four girls in the two rooms on the other side of the corridor. One, or four?

  She refused to accept either choice.

  Taking one last breath of clean air, she dropped to the floor and crawled to the room next to Charlotte’s, not yet blocked by the fire but uncomfortably warm and filled with smoke. She banged on the wall. “Charlotte! Charlotte!”

  She heard coughing, but nothing else. At least she was still alive.

  Dropping to her knees again, she scrabbled across the corridor to the room adjacent to Miss Smedley and her roommate and banged on that wall. “Alison! Alison!”

  “We’re here, Miss Wells!” came Miss Smedley’s panicked, coughing voice through the wall. “We’re trapped!”

  Concordia stopped to breathe into her shawl. Her eyes were stinging.

  Then she noticed a hole in the wall, near the baseboard, and remembered. Yes, of course.

  She groped the surface of the tables for something heavy. The pewter candlestick holder would have to do. She swung it with a strength she did not know she had.

  “The wall is thin, help me break it down!” she called. She kept at it, striking the wall again and again.

  The girls on the other side tore at the bits she had loosened.

  After several tries, the thin plaster and paper came down with a crash and a cloud of plaster dust mingling with the smoke. She never imagined she’d be so grateful for the cheap remodeling of the upstairs bedrooms, where one large room had been divided into three.

  She climbed through the debris, and the two sobbing girls collapsed into her arms.

  “We have to do the same with the next wall, and get to Anna and Mary.” Concordia passed Alison Smedley the candlestick, then picked up a silver urn.

  “That’s my mother’s!” Alison cried.

  Concordia ignored her and banged on the wall. “Mary, Anna, can you hear me?” She prayed they were still alive. She wheezed into her shawl, struggling to catch her breath. It felt as if an iron band was squeezing her chest.

  Having the advantage of practice, they quickly broke through the last wall and roused Mary and Anna.

  As the students crawled through the debris to reach the staircase, Concordia opened their window and waved away the ladder that had come into view. “We’re coming out! Get Charlotte!”

  Before she followed the girls down the stairs and outside to safety, she took one last look at the flames climbing up Charlotte Crandall’s door. She could only pray the ladder had reached her in time.

  Chapter 23

  Week 7, Instructor Calendar November 1898

  The lighting of rooms by means of lamps and candles is giving hostesses a great annoyance. There is scarcely a dinner-party but the candles set fire to their fringed shades, and a conflagration ensues. ~Mrs. John Sherwood

  Ruby was keeping the girls at a distance as the firemen worked, pulling out axes and unwinding the hose of their steam-driven pumper truck.

  “Is Charlotte out?” Concordia asked anxiously.

  Ruby pointed. Randolph Maynard was gently laying the inert form of Charlotte Crandall on the grass. Miss Jenkins and Miss Pomeroy crouched over her.

  Stumbling upon shaking legs, Concordia hurried to them.

  Miss Jenkins lifted her head from Charlotte’s chest. ““She’s alive, but she needs more than I can do.”

  “Has an ambulance been sent for?” Concordia knelt beside them.

  Miss Jenkins nodded.

  “Miss Kimble is rousing the other teachers, in case they are needed.” Miss Pomeroy pushed her braid over her shoulder and self-consciously tightened the sash of her robe. She turned back to Miss Jenkins. “Do you want the Willow Cottage girls to head over to the infirmary, so you can check them when you’re finished here?”

  Concordia stared. The lady principal could be surprisingly focused when the occasio
n called for it. Perhaps it took something as extreme as a burning building to rouse her.

  A pale-faced Maynard, clad in pajamas and robe, his dark hair tousled, ignored them all. He gently chafed Charlotte’s hands and wrists and murmured to her.

  “Does anyone know what happened?” Miss Jenkins asked.

  Concordia shook her head. “We awoke to the cottage on fire. It was already well underway.” She looked over at Willow Cottage, her heart a tight ball in her chest. The roof was now ablaze. Smoke billowed from the windows. Everything was gone.

  The fire chief approached them. “Who is in charge here?”

  Miss Pomeroy pointed to Edward Langdon.

  “Keep everyone farther back,” the chief told Langdon. He frowned at the swaying tree line in the distance. “We must evacuate the nearby cottages. I don’t like the look of the wind. We may not be able to keep it from spreading.”

  Fear prickled along Concordia’s spine. Langdon ran for the nearest cottage as quickly as his portly frame would allow.

  The teachers soon had their charges from the other four cottages swarming out of doors, clutching a few necessities.

  “Take them to the gymnasium for now,” Langdon called.

  The crowd quickly dispersed, the chill air an excellent motivator. Concordia lingered, glancing down anxiously at Charlotte Crandall. She had not regained consciousness.

  “Will she...be all right?” Concordia turned aside in a fit of coughing.

  Miss Jenkins bit her lip. “I am sorry to say I do not know. But I want you to go to the infirmary, Concordia. You need tending to.” She gestured to the burns along her forearm. Dazed, Concordia lifted her arm. How had that happened?

  “Come, dear.” Miss Pomeroy settled a shawl around Concordia’s shivering form. “There is nothing more you can do. The ambulance will arrive soon, I’m sure.”

  Hot tears prickling her eyes, she allowed Miss Pomeroy to draw her away.

  Chapter 24

  Week 7, Instructor Calendar November 1898

  The affections are too sacred for such outward showing, and the lookers-on are in a very disagreeable position. ~Mrs. John Sherwood

  A light pattering upon glass woke her later that morning. Concordia opened her eyes. Mercy, this was the second time she had been in the infirmary in the past three weeks. At least she had walked in under her own power this time.

  The day was off to a dreary start. Rain streaked the windows, and only a pearl-gray light penetrated the gloom.

  Miss Jenkins was turning up the lamps and noticed her stir. “How do you feel?”

  Concordia grimaced. “My throat hurts,” she croaked. She glanced in dismay at her soot-stained skirt and shirtwaist. She had fallen asleep fully dressed in her reading chair last night, waiting for Charlotte’s return.

  “I have clean clothes for you. You can wash up over there.” Miss Jenkins pointed to a sink, where a curtain was partially drawn. “It will have to do for now. Don’t get that bandage wet,” she added, nodding at Concordia’s forearm.

  Concordia stood and stretched, glancing around the room. There were only ten beds in the infirmary. The girls were sleeping two to a bed, with a few more curled up on blankets on the floor. “Are they all right?”

  “They will be, though the last four who came out with you breathed in much more smoke than is good for them. They will need longer to recover.” Miss Jenkins fixed her with a stern look. “Including you.”

  “I cannot argue with that,” Concordia said wearily. She still felt as if someone was sitting upon her chest. “Any word about Charlotte?”

  Miss Jenkins shook her head. “But Lieutenant Capshaw is waiting in my office to speak with you.”

  Concordia nodded in resignation. She expected Capshaw would be assigned the case. She cleaned up as best as she could, changed her clothes, and hurried to join him.

  He rose, unfolding his tall, gaunt frame from the chair. She gripped the doorjamb as she waited for a spasm of violent coughing to subside. His brow furrowed. “If you are not well enough for questions, miss, I can come back later.”

  She shook her head. He came over and helped her gently into a chair.

  She fought to suppress a sob. Capshaw’s non-customary tenderness threatened to undermine her self-control. Despite their long association and the fact that he had married her best friend Sophia, neither of them felt comfortable enough to address the other familiarly. Instead of Aaron and Concordia, they would forever be Lieutenant Capshaw and Miss Wells.

  Capshaw sat and smoothed his shaggy red mustache as he waited for her to regain her composure. The moment passed. Concordia squared her shoulders.

  “Now then.” He extracted his pencil stub and folded wad of paper. “I understand that the house was awoken by the fire around two this morning. Is that what you recollect?”

  She shrugged. “I did not observe the clock. I know I had been asleep for a while.”

  “What time did you retire, miss?”

  She hesitated. “I did not exactly retire. I waited up for someone and fell asleep in my chair. When I awoke, the cottage was on fire.”

  “What is the latest time you remember?”

  “Around eleven. Ruby was up as well.”

  “Who were you waiting for? I thought all of your students were bound by the ten o’clock rule.”

  She smiled briefly. Capshaw had become quite familiar with the ways of the college people he once professed he would never understand. “Miss Crandall is a substitute teacher, and not bound by the rule.”

  Capshaw scribbled a note. “Why were you awaiting Miss Crandall’s return?”

  She hesitated. “It is a school matter, and can have no bearing here.”

  He raised a skeptical brow. “You know from previous experience that we cannot assume that, but we’ll let it go for the moment. Would Ruby know what time Miss Crandall returned?”

  “I do not know.” She watched him fiddle with his pencil. “Lieutenant, do you know how the fire started?”

  He shook his head. “It’s still too hot to go through. And we’ll have to be extremely careful when we do. The second floor buckled and partially collapsed into the kitchen. Most of the roof is gone. The fire chief thinks we can conduct a preliminary examination later today. Perhaps the ladies can even recover a few belongings. If the structure is safe enough to enter.”

  Dread gripped Concordia’s abdomen at the thought of losing her home and nearly all of her earthly possessions. “Were the other residences damaged?”

  He consulted his notes. “The nearest cottage, Hemlock, has a partially burned roof. It is reparable, I hear. The other cottages were spared. The firemen worked tirelessly through the night.”

  She felt a wave of gratitude for the strangers who had saved them.

  “Tell me about the night-time routine,” he said, folding back a fresh slip of paper. “Does anyone customarily leave a candle or lantern burning in the window of the corridor overnight?”

  “No, nothing of the sort,” she said. “We have them for emergencies, but the cottage was converted to electric lights years ago. We never leave anything burning.”

  “I see. And the fire was concentrated in the corridor, farthest from the stairs?”

  She nodded. “It was blocking the doors of the three rooms at that end of the hallway.”

  “It was not coming from within a room, but outside, in the hall?”

  “As far as I could tell. It was difficult to see through the smoke.”

  “Who lives in those rooms?”

  “Misses Connor and Jackson are in the room nearest the end of the corridor on the left, and Misses Smedley and Tate are on the same side, in the room next door. Miss Crandall’s room is directly across, on the right side of the corridor.”

  “Does anyone have a grudge against one of these individuals?” Capshaw asked.

  Concordia started. “A grudge? Enough to set a fire in front of her door and try to kill her? That is ridiculous.”

  As ridiculous as it
was, her mind raced through the possibilities. Could Miss Smedley have been the target? No, no, that would point to Miss Lovelace. Impossible. She swallowed, remembering the girl’s anger and impatience to have Miss Smedley punished.

  Capshaw’s eyes narrowed. “For a minute there, you were considering it.”

  “How is Miss Crandall?” she asked, in a change of subject.

  He grimaced. “Still unconscious. I am anxious to speak with her. She may have been the last person to retire for the night. It’s possible she noticed something.”

  “When may I visit her?”

  “I will ask, and send word.”

  She stood, as did he. “Thank you. What will you do next?”

  “After going through the remnants of Willow Cottage with the fire chief, I will begin an investigation of each of the young ladies who were put directly in harm’s way.”

  She caught her breath. “Including Miss Crandall?”

  He gave her a sharp look. “Of course. What is it, Miss Wells?”

  She hesitated. “Miss Crandall and Mr. Maynard have become good friends, spending much of their free time together. Oh, nothing unseemly,” she added hastily, at the policeman’s melancholy expression. “I am only telling you so that you will exercise discretion in that regard.”

  His frown deepened. “I am always discreet.”

  There was a knock on the door and David entered. His face lit up in relief. “I stayed at my parents’ house last night, I only just heard.” He bundled her in his arms. She buried her face in the lapels of his jacket. “My dear,” he murmured into her hair. “Thank heaven you are safe.”

  Capshaw diplomatically cleared his throat, and they jumped apart.

  “Sorry, lieutenant,” David said. “Has she told you what we have figured out about Guryev?”

  Capshaw shook his head. “We were discussing the fire. What about Guryev?”