Scandal On Rincon Hill

by Shirley Tallman

  “Tell me more about the party you attended last night, if you would, Judge Woolson,” requested George. “I've sent for some of my men and a wagon to transport the body, but while we wait I'd like to hear about this Logan fellow.”

  “I can't say that I know much more than I've already told you,” Papa said thoughtfully. “In fact, the only reason I remember the young man at all is because of the argument he had with the Reverend Mayfield.”

  “And what argument was that, sir?” asked George, once again opening his notebook and moving closer to Samuel's lantern. Pencil poised, he regarded Papa with keen interest.

  “It was just the usual folderol between the church and the scientific world, this time over Charles Darwin's theory of evolution.” Papa harrumphed, displaying grave misgivings that the human race could possibly have developed from a lower form of animal species. “Logan began quoting from Darwin's latest epic, The Descent of Man, and not surprisingly the Reverend Mayfield took exception to this reference, as well he should. I'm sorry to say, the two of them went at it hammer and tong for some little time before our host managed to break them up.” He chuckled. “I thought for a while the two might actually come to blows over the idiotic book.”

  “You said the Reverend Mayfield became upset?” inquired George, looking up from his pad.

  “I'd say he was a damn sight more than upset,” answered Papa, still smiling at the memory. Then, for the first time he regarded the younger man as if just now realizing where his questions were leading.

  “Wait a minute, George,” he went on. “What are you getting at? It's true that both men were agitated, but if you're trying to imply that the Reverend Mayfield was so angry he followed Logan and murdered him because he disagreed with his beliefs, you're barking up the wrong tree. I've known Erasmus Mayfield for fifteen years, and he's one of the few ministers of my acquaintance that I consider to be a true man of God.” He nodded toward the crumpled body. “I assure you, sir, that the Reverend Mayfield is incapable of violence, much less the degree of brutality visited upon this unfortunate soul.”

  George raised a hand, obviously in an attempt to calm my father. “Please, Judge Woolson, I didn't mean to imply that I thought Mr., er, the Reverend Mayfield killed Mr. Logan. I'm just trying to collect information about the victim, particularly the time leading up to his murder. It occurred to me that maybe someone else, someone who overheard the argument, say, might have been so het up about Nigel Logan's support of Mr. Darwin's book, that he thought to teach the young scientist a lesson. And maybe that lesson went too far and the man accidentally killed the fellow.”

  I considered this highly unlikely, and said so. “Come now, George, churches have been railing against Darwin's hypothesis for over twenty years. I can't imagine anyone at the Tremaines' party becoming so distraught over Logan's argument with the Reverend Mayfield that he would bludgeon the man to death.”

  Samuel nodded in agreement. “Sarah's right. Excuse the pun, George, but the severity of those blows to Logan's head strike me as overkill. This attack has the feel of a more personal crime, as if the killer bore an intense grudge against the fellow.”

  “Maybe, maybe not,” commented George, unconvinced by this argument. “I see cases like this every day, more than I care to recall. And I've come across many a rough who'll beat a man to death for the sheer love of the kill. Doesn't seem to matter if he knows the bloke or not.”

  Samuel seemed about to offer another objection, but was distracted by the sound of a police wagon clattering across the bridge. Papa, Samuel, and I remained standing by the body, while George and Officer Kostler went to meet the men. A few minutes later, they returned with three uniformed policemen, two of them carrying a stretcher.

  Before George would allow them to move the body, however, he asked one of the new arrivals to sketch the scene, paying particular attention to the position of the corpse in relationship to the bridge support, as well as its rough distance from the top of the dirt embankment.

  “This isn't exactly police procedure,” he commented, directing a self-conscious look at my father. “But Fuller here has a good eye and does a bang-up job with a sketch pad. I find it helps me remember the condition of the body and where we found it. I've heard that some police departments back East have actually started to take photographic pictures of crime scenes, but so far we haven't been able to convince the commissioner that it's worth the expense.”

  “I think it's a wonderful idea, George,” I said, regarding him with newfound respect. Ever since he had made sergeant earlier that year, he seemed to be developing into a fine detective. “Imagine how helpful it would be to have a true repre sen ta tion of a murder site, one that could be examined at a later date for missed or overlooked evidence?”

  Papa looked skeptical. “Considering all the time it takes for one of these photographer fellows to get a halfway decent likeness of their subject, I can't see the process being of much use to the police for years to come, if ever.”

  With this somewhat cynical pronouncement, my father turned and commenced the laborious climb back to the top of the embankment. Samuel and I waited where we were until Fuller completed his sketch (which was remarkably good considering how quickly it had been rendered), then watched as the remaining policemen loaded the victim's body onto the stretcher. Given the steep grade leading up to the waiting police wagon, George and Samuel were forced to lend a hand in order to prevent the stretcher bearers from losing their precarious foothold and sliding down the hill, taking their heavy burden with them.

  I followed this procession, steadying my lantern in an effort to see where I was placing my boots. Even then it became necessary for Samuel to take hold of my hand and pull me up the final half-dozen feet or so. As he did, I was dismayed to see a taxi pull to an abrupt stop by the side of the bridge. I recognized the man who exited the carriage as Ozzie Foldger, a crime reporter who frequently competed with Samuel for stories.

  “Who do you suppose tipped him off?” murmured my brother, eyeing the short, tubby little man who had a well-earned reputation for the ruthless tactics he all too often employed in his quest to scoop other reporters. “Sometimes I think that man has a telegraph machine installed inside his head.”

  Foldger gave Samuel a mocking smile, nodded in some surprise to me, then blinked in astonishment when he recognized our father standing by the police van. The reporter acknowledged Papa's presence with a polite tip of his cap, then pulled out his own notebook and pencil and set off to corner Sergeant Lewis. George shot a helpless look at my brother, then with unhappy resignation began to answer Ozzie's rapid-fire questions.

  With a muttered oath, Samuel kept a wary eye on his rival, as the stretcher bearers loaded the body into the police wagon. Seemingly using this as an excuse, George broke away from Foldger, bid my father and me a hasty good morning, and joined Kostler and their fellow officers for the ride to the city morgue. With another sardonic smile, Ozzie Foldger pocketed his notebook and got back into his waiting cab.

  As Papa, Samuel, and I started for home, I was unnerved to see our father silently considering his youngest son, a perplexed look on his face. I could tell that Samuel, too, felt the tension which hung over our heads like a heavy swirl of morning fog. Indeed, the unspoken strain between my brother and father seemed to build with each step we took, until the short, two-block walk home felt closer to a mile.

  It was a relief when we finally reached our house and were once again inside the quiet foyer. I headed immediately for the stairs, suddenly very weary and looking forward to the comfort of my bed. My brother followed closely upon my heels, eager, I was certain, to escape Papa's probing gaze. We had gone only a few steps, however, when we were halted by our father's voice.

  “Wait a minute, the two of you,” he said, his tone pitched low enough not to awaken the rest of the family, but with a sharp bite of authority. He regarded us levelly from the hallway below. “You must think me remarkably naïve to accept without question how my tw
o youngest children came to be standing beneath the Harrison Street Bridge in the middle of the night, examining a brutally murdered young man. I heard no police bells or other sounds of alarm, and even if I had, I would hardly expect the two of you to rise from your beds at that ungodly hour and chase after them.”

  I glanced nervously at Samuel who stood a little below me on the stairs. His handsome face betrayed his agitation as he struggled to come up with some rational explanation for this admittedly irrational act.

  Before he could manufacture an excuse, however, Papa sighed and gestured dismissively with his hand. “Oh, never mind. I'm too tired to listen to what are sure to be a litany of woeful excuses.”

  He used his thumb and forefinger to rub the bridge above his nose, a gesture he often performed when he was suffering a headache. “Your mother and I plan to spend the day with friends in the country. I'm going to try to get what rest I can before it's time to leave.”

  He lowered his hand and stared deliberately at each of us in turn. “But don't either of you think for one moment that this marks the end of our discussion. I know you two are up to something, and I have every intention of finding out what it is.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  Samuel and I spent Sunday afternoon creating—and just as quickly discarding—a number of mostly ridiculous reasons to explain our presence at a murder scene that morning. The simple truth, of course, was that we had no good excuse for being there. Short of telling Papa an outright lie, which neither of us cared to do, we were forced to admit that we had done a pretty thorough job of painting ourselves into a corner. To make matters worse, our father had always possessed an uncanny ability to see through our fabrications, a decided disadvantage for any child, much less an adult.

  In a cowardly attempt to avoid Papa, Samuel spent Sunday evening at his club, while I judiciously retired to my room before my parents returned from their visit to the country. Although this was, strictly speaking, my brother's problem, we had long been (in Papa's words) partners in dev ilment, and I felt a certain sisterly loyalty. Despite the provocation, I vowed not to betray my brother's secret identity as the infamous Ian Fearless, intrepid crime reporter.

  In a continued effort to avoid the inevitable confrontation, I set off for my Sutter Street office earlier than usual the following morning. I arrived to find my downstairs neighbor, Fanny Goodman, speaking to a strikingly lovely girl outside her millinery shop. The young woman was holding a baby in her arms.

  “Ah, Sarah, I'm glad to see you,” Fanny said with a welcoming smile. “This young lady has come to consult you on a legal matter.” She made a soft, clucking sound with her tongue, and gave the girl a look of mild reproof. “I offered to take her inside where it's warmer for the baby, but she insisted on waiting for you out here.”

  I gave the young woman my full attention, and was surprised to realize that she was younger than I'd first assumed; certainly she could be no more than eighteen or nineteen. This observation alone was startling, since I could think of little reason why someone hardly out of childhood should seek my professional services.

  “My dear,” Fanny went on, “may I introduce Miss Sarah Woolson. Sarah, this is Miss Brielle Bouchard. And this little darling”—she tickled the baby under its chin until it gurgled happily—“is Emma.”

  I was well aware of my neighbor's fondness for children, an affection undoubtedly sharpened by the unhappy fact that she and her late husband had remained childless throughout their marriage. In this instance, however, I had to agree that little Emma was very pretty indeed, with pink cheeks, a button nose, wispy blond curls that surrounded her chubby face like a halo, and wide, amazingly attentive blue eyes. I judged the child to be no more than three or four months old, and was struck by her remarkable alertness.

  Miss Bouchard smiled and bounced the baby proudly in her arms, as both Fanny and I made much of the tyke. Indeed, she appeared to be the most loving and solicitous of mothers, somewhat unexpected, I thought, for one of such tender years. At length, however, Fanny reluctantly excused herself and I led my prospective client up the stairs to my office.

  Perhaps I should pause briefly in my narrative and explain how I came to acquire the above-mentioned workplace. I have already stated that I am a lawyer, having passed my California Bar exami-nations some eighteen months earlier. Since woman are still unfairly excluded from most of the country's law schools—California being no exception—I must thank my father for his evenhandedness in exposing his only daughter to the same quality of education he aff orded my three older brothers, Frederick, Charles, and of course Samuel, whom you have already met.

  For the first nine months of my legal career, I worked as an associate attorney for Shepard, Shepard, McNaughton, and Hall, one of San Francisco's most prestigious law firms. It was during this time that I made the acquaintance of Chinatown's most dangerous and mysterious tong lord, Li Ying. You may well wonder why I choose to call such a villain my friend, nay, my benefactor; I have certainly asked myself the same question innumerable times. Suf-fice it to say that Mr. Li is, in his own way, one of the most honorable and brilliant men I have had occasion to meet.

  In fact, it was the generous fee I was paid for representing one of Li's countrymen that enabled me to leave Joseph Shepard's narrow-minded law firm, and take up quarters here on Sutter Street. While it's true that I cannot state with certainty how long I'll be able to maintain my two-room office over Fanny Goodman's millinery store, I have adopted as my motto, “sufficient unto the day,” and try not to worry about the future.

  It was into the main room of this small, second-floor suite that I led the young woman. Seating her on one of the room's three chairs, I removed my wrap and took a seat behind my fine old cherrywood desk. I frankly admit that I was curious to hear what had brought Miss Bouchard to my place of business. (Since I could see no wedding band on the third finger of her left hand, I was forced to assume she was unwed).

  “Now, then, my dear,” I said, assuming a reassuring smile. “How may I help you?”

  Settling the baby comfortably in her lap, she looked me straight in the eye. Her gaze was uncomfortably direct for such a slip of a girl.

  “I would like your help enforcing a contract which was signed by a gentleman and myself nearly two years ago,” she stated without preamble.

  Again, I was taken aback by the girl's poise and self-confidence. Her voice was well modulated and pleasant, and her speech pattern indicated that she had enjoyed a better than average education. Now that I had the opportunity to examine her muted violet gown, I could see that it was not only the latest Paris fashion, but that it perfectly fitted her slender but shapely figure. Her neat little black boots, lace reticule, and matching parasol complemented her dress. An abundance of soft blond hair was styled in shiny ringlets to frame a beautiful face, and was topped by a small black hat which she had tipped becomingly to one side. Her wide violet eyes, I was surprised to note, closely matched my own in color, if not in shape, hers being of a more oblong curvature than mine. Taken as a whole, I decided, Brielle Bouchard was an exceedingly attractive young woman.

  My curiosity could no longer be contained.

  “Miss Bouchard,” I ventured, “please forgive me for asking such a personal question, but may I inquire your age?”

  “Certainly, Miss Woolson,” she replied without the least discom-fiture, “I will be twenty next summer.”

  I gestured toward the baby contentedly resting in her arms. “And little Emma is—”

  “Yes, Miss Woolson, Emma is my child. And no, I am not married to her father. He is, in fact, already married and the father of three children.” She shifted her right elbow to rest more comfortably against the arm of the chair, the better to support the baby's weight. “I was his mistress for just over eighteen months. He arranged for me to live in a fashionable house on Pacific Avenue, where he employed a most adequate household staff, and provided me with a generous weekly allowance.”

  It shames me to admit
that I was by now staring at the girl in astonishment. “Good heavens, Miss Bouchard. That means you were barely seventeen when—when you—”

  “When I became a kept woman, Miss Woolson?” She regarded me with those lovely, far too experienced violet eyes. A brief smile curved her lips, revealing delightful dimples to either side of her graceful mouth.

  “Please do not appear so mortified,” she continued. “And do not attempt to prettify my profession. I know full well what I became then, and what I remain to this day. However, I must assure you that I was entirely an innocent when I agreed to become the gentleman's mistress. That was, in fact, one of my benefactor's conditions. He feared contracting a disease from any woman who had been with another man. He went so far as to have me examined by his personal physician, to ensure that I was telling him no less than the truth.”

  To my chagrin, I felt my face flush. This child was nine years my junior, yet she was able to discuss with perfect aplomb a subject abhorred, and as far as possible ignored, by polite society. Naturally, I was fully aware of the many houses of ill repute which flourished in San Francisco. Yet to hear it discussed with such casual abandon, by this angelic-looking creature, was astonishing to say the least.

  “Miss Bouchard,” I said, endeavoring to mask my discomfiture. “Perhaps if you were to relate the circumstances which led you to your present, er, occupation I might—”

  “I think not, Miss Woolson,” replied the young woman, quietly but with firm resolve. “My past can have nothing to do with the matter which has brought me to your office this morning. I read about you in the newspapers and, given the rather sensitive nature of my business, decided that I would prefer to be represented by a woman rather than a male attorney.”