by P. B. Ryan
She scolded herself for calling attention to her presence, but the damage was done. “Bistouries are surgical knives that are quite narrow,” she explained, “and sometimes curved, like that one. And very sharp at the tip.” Gracie stirred, but settled back down when Nell rubbed her back.
“It’s obviously a well-used blade,” Thorpe said, “but he’s kept it honed. The blade is stamped ‘Tiemann.’“
“That’s the manufacturer,” said Viola. “That bistoury is part of a pocket surgery kit I gave Will for Christmas when he came home that last...well, it was his last Christmas with us, in sixty-three. He and Robbie were both granted two-week furloughs. Robbie was with us the whole time, but Will only stayed two days. The last time I spoke to him was Christmas night, as he was heading up for bed. The next morning, he was gone. I never saw him again.”
“A pocket surgery kit?” Thorpe said.
“Yes, it was this little leather roll with the instruments tucked inside. He had his full-size kit, of course, but I thought a portable set might come in handy. Where did you get that?”
“From the policeman who arrested your son. William...” Wrapping the bistoury back up, he said, “I’m sorry, Viola. William used it to cut a man’s throat.”
Color leeched from her face. Her husband sat back, slid off his spectacles, rubbed the bridge of his nose.
The alderman poured himself another whiskey. “Your son—or rather, William Touchette—has been formally charged with murder. He killed a merchant seaman in an alley next to the boardinghouse late last night. Fellow by the name of Ernest Tulley.”
“No,” Viola said dazedly. “No. I don’t believe it. Why on earth would he do such a thing?”
“He wouldn’t say, even after the boys...well, they, uh, interrogated him at some length last night, but he wasn’t talking. As near as they can figure, it was a frenzy of intoxication. The other sailors say he’d come there to smoke opium. There’s a room set aside for—”
“Opium?” She shook her head. “My Will...he would never...” Her normally throaty voice grew shrill. “He’s a surgeon, for God’s sake! August, tell him.” She pounded the arms of her wheelchair. “Tell him! Will could never—”
“Viola...” Her husband rose and went to her.
“Tell him,” she implored, clutching his coat sleeve. “Please, August.”
Nell stared, dumbfounded. Never in the three years she’d known Viola Hewitt had she seen her lose her composure, even for a moment.
“Viola, I’ll take care of—”
“There’s been some horrible mistake,” she told Thorpe in the strained voice of someone struggling to get herself in hand. “I know my Will. He...he was always...spirited, but he could never take a life. He’s a healer. Leo, please...”
Her husband took her by the shoulders, gentling his voice. “Do you trust me, Viola?”
“You know he didn’t do this, don’t you?”
“You must get hold of yourself, my dear. Giving vent to one’s emotions merely makes them more obdurate—you know that. Now, I’m going to take Leo upstairs, to the library, to sort this thing—”
“No. No! Stay here. I’ll stay calm. I’ll—”
“You’ve too delicate a disposition for such matters, my dear. I’ll take care of everything, but I must caution you not to make mention of this to anyone—and that includes Martin and Harry.”
“I can’t tell them their own brother is alive? And arrested for murder? For heaven’s sake, August, they’ll find out sooner or later.”
“Just trust me, Viola. Thorpe.” Hewitt motioned his friend to follow as he left the room.
“August!” she cried as the two men headed for the curved stairway that led from the back end of the center hall to the upper floors. “What do you mean, you’re going to ‘take care of everything’? What does that mean, August?”
“Mrs. Hewitt...” Nell began.
“I’ve got to get upstairs,” she said in a quavering voice as she grabbed the folding canes off the back of her chair. “Where’s Mrs. Bouchard?”
“It’s Sunday. She’s got the day—”
“You help me, then.” Yanking the canes open, she planted them on the Oriental rug. “Hurry!”
“Ma’am...” Nell looked from the sleeping child in her arms toward the ceiling, where footsteps squeaked; the library was directly overhead, right off the second floor landing.
“You’re right. By the time I got up there... You go!”
“Me? They’ll never let me—”
“Tiptoe upstairs and listen outside the door.”
“Eavesdrop?”
“Just don’t let anyone see you. Be on the lookout for Mrs. Mott. She can be quiet as death, that one.”
“Mrs. Hewitt, your husband will dismiss me for sure if he catches me.” He’d sacked employees for far less.
“He won’t if I make enough of a fuss. You know he can’t bear to distress me. Nell, please.” Tears trembled in Viola’s eyes. “I’m pleading with you. I’ve got to find out what he’s planning to do. I’m so afraid... Please.” Plucking a lace-edged handkerchief from her sleeve, she blotted her eyes and held out her arms. “I’ll take Gracie. Hurry!”
Gracie mewed like a vexed kitten when Nell rose and carried her across the room. “No...” the child griped sleepily, no doubt assuming she was being taken upstairs to finish her nap in the nursery. “Want Miseeney.” She jammed those two fingers in her mouth, eyes half-closed, pinkened right cheek imprinted from the double row of tiny covered buttons on Nell’s bodice.
“Miseeney has to go now,” Nell said softly as she tucked the child in her adoptive mother’s lap. “Nana will hold you.” Having Gracie call her “Nana” had been Viola’s idea; it would inspire too many raised eyebrows in public, she reasoned, for such a young child to call a woman of her advanced years “Mama.”
Nell stole upstairs as quietly as she could, thankful for the carpeted stairs and the plush Aubusson on the landing. Muffled voices grew louder as she neared the closed library door, where she paused, sketched a swift sign of the cross. Please, St. Dismas, please, please, please don’t let him open that door and find me lurking here. Funny how she still directed her prayers to the patron saint of thieves, after all these years.
“He could hang for this, you know.” Leo Thorpe.
“Has he been arraigned yet?” asked Hewitt.
“Yes, and he was utterly uncooperative. Waived his right to counsel, made no attempt to defend himself. Refused to plead, so the court entered a not guilty plea on his behalf. He did ask for bail, though, and I understand he seemed quite put out when it was denied, as is customary in cases that warrant the death penalty. He’ll be detained until trial.”
Hewitt grunted. “Arrogant bastard didn’t think he needed a lawyer. Serves him right.”
“Of course...given your position and influence, if you were of a mind to get the bail decision overturned...”
“I’m not about to grease some judge’s palm just so that damnable blackguard can be free to cut some other poor bastard’s throat.”
This was the first time Nell had ever heard coarse language spoken in this house. She would not have expected it from the rigidly proper August Hewitt, even with no ladies present.
“Are you...quite sure, old chap? He is, after all, your son. I mean, I appreciate that you’re less than sympathetic right now, but given time to reflect—”
“Not one red cent. Damn him,” Hewitt said shakily. “Damn him for doing this to his mother. To go three years—over three years—without letting us know he was alive, and then this...this... By Jove, he committed murder! If he was innocent, he would have pled not guilty right from the start. And opium? He was always a bad egg. Sad to say, but even as a little child, I knew he would come to no good.”
“Heartbreaking, when they’re born that way.”
“Of course, Viola is soft-hearted when it comes to William. Understandable. He’s her firstborn, and women are sentimental creatures.”
“What address did he give?” Hewitt asked.
“Some hotel. He doesn’t have a permanent address.”
“Well, not here in Boston, but surely—”
“Anywhere. He appears to be something of a nomad.”
“A Hewitt wandering around homeless. Never thought I’d see the day.”
“Say, Hewitt,” Mr. Thorpe began, “is it true you’ve got a bottle of hundred-year-old cognac locked up in that cabinet?”
“It is, but you’re daft if you think you’re getting any. It’s the last of a case my grandfather bought from Hennessy’s first shipment to New York in seventeen ninety-four, and I’m saving it for the birth of my first grandchild. There’s a nice tawny port in that decanter—help yourself.”
“I do believe I will.”
“Cigar?”
“Capital!”
In the ensuing silence, Nell perused the paintings hung close together on the darkly paneled walls—Mrs. Hewitt’s portraits of her family, bordered in ornate gilt frames. Here on the landing there was one of her husband with his three younger sons and several of those sons posing separately and in pairs. Achingly handsome men, in particular the late Robbie, with his thick, gilded hair and dramatic black eyebrows. Around the corner, in the corridor leading to the family bedrooms, were many more of her paintings, most of the Hewitt scions ranging in age from infancy through their twenties. Notably absent from the collection was any depiction of their eldest son. All Nell really knew about William Hewitt was that he’d been schooled, from early childhood, in Great Britain.
Hewitt’s voice penetrated the thick oak door again. “There was always a William Problem, from the moment he was born. I must say, Viola handled his youthful misdeeds with remarkable aplomb, but this... He’s gone too far. I won’t have her exposed to him. Her health’s been fragile, you know, ever since she fell ill in Europe. I don’t think she could endure the strain, if I were to let William back in her life—not with what he’s become.”
“Damn fine cigar,” Thorpe muttered.
“Rest assured, Thorpe, it is my intent that William be prosecuted to the fullest extent possible—but under this assumed name, mind you. What is it, again? Something French.”
“Touchette,” Thorpe replied, still mispronouncing it. “But won’t he be recognized for who he really is?”
“Unlikely. William grew up in England, remember, except for summers, and he always went with us to the Cape. He actually spent very little time in Boston, and Viola could almost never get him to go calling with her, or to dinners and dances, so he met hardly anyone. Robbie was the only one he spent any time with—and your Jack, of course. Robbie wouldn’t go anywhere without him—remember?”
“Yes, quite. Oh—! Did I tell you Orville Pratt and I are bringing Jack aboard as a junior partner in the firm? We’re going to make it official when we announce Jack’s engagement to Cecilia Pratt—probably during the Pratt’s annual ball.”
“Excellent! Jack’s a fine young man—as was Robbie, despite William’s efforts to corrupt them both. But as to his being recognized, rest assured there’s not a soul in Boston—aside from Jack, I suppose—who would know him if he saw him on the street. Except, of course, for those fellows at the station house. They’re the ones who trouble me. How many are there?”
“Well, Johnston, of course—the one who remembered arresting him. He told one or two others, including Captain Baxter, and Baxter summoned me. I gave orders for no one else to be told until I could speak to you, and I had him put in his own cell, away from the other prisoners.”
“Those who know must be silenced. From what I hear, there isn’t a single member of the Boston Police Department who wouldn’t sell his mother into white slavery for the price of a pint of ale.”
Even through the door, Nell heard Thorpe’s deep sigh.
“Offer them whatever it will take for them to forget who William Touchette really is,” said Hewitt. “And of course I expect a certain zeal in bringing him to justice. Perhaps a bonus for those involved once he’s found guilty and sentenced. Have this Captain Baxter handle it. But talk to him soon, before he and the others start opening their mouths.”
“It will be done within the hour.”
“I don’t want my name mentioned, Thorpe, or yours. It goes no further than Baxter.”
“What about the girl? That pretty little governess?”
“Nell? She’s devoted to my wife. She’ll keep her mouth shut if I explain to her that it’s in Viola’s best interest—which, of course, it is, although Viola won’t see it that way. As for William, I want him out of that station house and away from prying eyes as soon as it can be arranged.”
“He’s to be transferred to the county jail on Charles Street tomorrow to await trial.”
“Good. Bury him as deep in that bloody mausoleum as you can get him.” Now it was Hewitt’s turn to sigh. “Damn him.”
“Miss Sweeney?”
Nell whirled around, her heart kicking. “Master Martin.” He’d come around the corner, evidently on his way downstairs. “I was just looking at your mother’s paintings,” she said as she walked past him, into the corridor proper, so as not to be heard by the men in the library.
“Extraordinary, aren’t they?” He looked about fifteen when he smiled like that. “I keep telling her she should hang them downstairs, where visitors can see them, but she thinks that would be vulgar.”
Taking in the myriad paintings lining the long, high-ceilinged passageway, she said, “I was wondering why there are none of your brother William.”
“I assumed you knew.” Martin shoved his hands in his trouser pockets. “He was the black sheep of the family.”
“I suppose I suspected that. No one ever talks about him.”
“Father doesn’t like to hear his name—even now that he’s gone. I find it hard to understand. I mean, he can’t have been any worse than Harry, and Harry’s always in one fix or another—either it’s his drinking, or his gambling, or his...” Martin looked away, clearly discomfited.
“His mill girls?” This from Harry himself as he emerged from his room down the hall, teeth flashing, tawny hair well brushed and gleaming. The only evidence of last night’s excesses would be his complexion, which had that bleached-out Sunday palor, and a certain puffiness around the eyes. “Say it, Martin. Our lovely Miseeney is much like mother, you know—unshockable.” Surveying Nell’s dress from neckline to hem, he said, “And doesn’t she look fetching this morning. Is that a new shade of gray?”
“Morning?” Martin scoffed. “It’s two-thirty in the afternoon, Harry. And I hardly think Miss Sweeney appreciates your mockery.”
“Miss Sweeney recognizes a good-natured jest when she hears it. Are you saying you’re the only one who’s allowed to flirt with her? Hardly seems fair.”
“I wasn’t... We weren’t...” Even in the dimly lit corridor, Nell could see Martin’s ears flare crimson.
“If he takes any liberties,” Harry told Nell as he sauntered past, “you must call me at once.” With a wink, and leaning conspiratorially close, he added, “I’d give anything to witness that.”
* * *
This was the first time Nell had ever seen Viola Hewitt cry. It wasn’t gentle weeping, either, but great, hoarse sobs that shook her to the bones as she sat hunched over the writing desk in her pink and gold sitting room. “It’s all my fault,” she kept wailing into her handkerchief. “All my fault...”
“Of course it’s not your fault,” Nell soothed as she kept half an eye on Gracie in her Nana’s adjacent boudoir, dragging hatboxes out of the closet while Viola’s lady’s maid, Paola Gabrielli, sat in the corner sewing a veil onto a purple velvet bonnet. “How could it be your fault?”
Viola shook her head, tears dripping onto the letter in front of her, a letter that began, Dear Will... “Oh, God. I’m a horrible mother.”
“You’re a wonderful mother.”
“No, you don’t know. You don
’t know. And now...and now my baby, my Will... They’re going to h-hang him. And it’s all my fault.”
Her fault? Did she knife that man outside Flynn’s boardinghouse? Did she tell Alderman Thorpe to bury her son “as deep as you can get him” in the Charles Street Jail? There were people responsible for begetting this situation and making it worse, but it seemed to Nell that Viola Hewitt was as blameless a victim of it as Ernest Tulley.
Heedless of the tear stains dotting the letter, Viola folded it and tucked it into an envelope, on which she wrote, in her signature violet ink, Dr. William Hewitt before drawing up short. She jammed the pen back in the crystal inkwell, tore the envelope away and replaced it with a fresh one, which she addressed to Mr. William Touchette. She heated a stick of violet sealing wax in the flame of her desktop candle, melted it into a tiny silver spoon, dripped the molten wax onto the envelope’s flap and imprinted it with her monogrammed insignia.
“You must take this to Will,” she told Nell.
“What?” Nell exclaimed as her employer shoved the letter in her hand.
“You’re the only one who can do this, Nell. God knows August won’t. He won’t even acknowledge Will as a member of this family. He doesn’t care if he hangs—you told me so yourself. And he’ll be livid if I bring Martin or Harry in on this.”
“Mrs. Hewitt, I—”
“Do it this afternoon. Once they transfer him to the county jail, you’ll have a hard time gaining access to him. Right now, he’s at the Division Two station house, which is on Williams Court. I used to bring blankets and Bibles to the prisoners there. Each holding cell has a sort of anteroom for visitors. You’ll be able to talk to him without anyone overhearing you.”
“What if Mr. Hewitt sees me leave? Or Hitchens?” The devoted valet reported everything to his employer. August Hewitt would cast her out in a heartbeat if he found out she’d gone behind his back. Nell’s most harrowing nightmare—the one from which she literally awoke in a sweat from time to time—was the one where she found herself back in her old life, with no home, no family...and worst of all, no Gracie. “Won’t it look suspicious, me going out after deciding to stay home because it was snowing so hard?”