And as far as Adam could reckon, wading through her weaving dialogue, Fremark hadn’t told his wife or even hinted at why he would have needed to speak to Adam urgently.
After a few more minutes of listening to Mrs. Fremark sob and ramble, he had excused himself and taken his leave. There was nothing more he could do for her except find the person who’d shattered her life. And even that, Adam well knew, would make little difference in stemming the grief and loneliness—and keeping the bills paid.
There were still others on his list to speak to—more of Billings’s business associates, including the Tituses. Agent Pierce had little new to report based on his interviews but would continue with his task and send word to Adam if he learned anything relevant.
Adam also intended to find the offices of the District Herald in hopes of tracking down the elusive Henry Altman.
With a lingering guilt over Fremark’s death, Adam duly went about his business of interviewing the people on his list, and found more of the same: Custer Billings was well respected, and though being an open abolitionist, he was fairly well liked. No one seemed to have any reason to want him dead. None of the men he spoke with gave any hint of a relationship between Billings and Annabelle Titus—or that Billings stepped out on his wife at all. Adam began to wonder whether Delton’s impression was simply wrong.
Neither of the Tituses were home when he called at their ostentatious home on Third Street, and Adam was reluctant to leave a message with the servants. He did ask the butler, who had coal-black skin and a stiff, uptight manner, whether the Billings ever called there.
“I’m not permitted to divulge any information,” he replied with an unfamiliar accent and a sneer. And he very nearly closed the door on Adam’s boot.
Adam was beginning to wonder if the death of Billings had simply been a random act perpetrated by a group of Lincoln haters who either wanted to send a warning to the new president or simply to make a statement by ruining his celebration.
But more likely the murder—with the victim once again a random choice—had been meant as a distraction to give them the opportunity to actually strike at Lincoln himself. Their plot was foiled when there was no hullabaloo about the crime, and their target left the ball early.
What had become obvious, however, was that Fremark’s death was not only related to the murder of Custer Billings, but it had been handled in a completely different manner. Instead of leaving his body in a public place where it would readily be found, the killer had hidden it. Was that important in itself, or merely a matter of convenience for the culprit?
Adam stewed over these thoughts and more as he made his way around the city, on foot and via the omnibus when he could.
Tracking animals in the woods and discerning their stories was a hell of a lot easier than investigating a murder, he decided. Animals generally acted as they were created to do: hunting, hiding, fighting, mating, traveling—all in the same way each species had done for thousands of years. They simply didn’t deviate from their basic nature.
The same could not be said for man, who lied, manipulated, and acted on emotions like greed, anger, love, and hate.
Speaking of love . . . that reminded him to wonder again about the identity of Hurst Lemagne’s lady friend. If she’d been a fancy girl in one of the brothels—many of which were conveniently near the Capitol—surely the man wouldn’t have balked at giving out her name. The fact that Lemagne hadn’t owned up to it suggested either he was lying or the woman was married and he didn’t want to ruin her reputation any more than he wanted to ruin Annabelle Titus’s.
And then there was greed. Adam hadn’t reckoned over that very much in the way of motives, but Billings had been wealthy, to be sure. What would happen to his business? His wife would inherit any money and property—
“Mr. Quinn! Mr. Quinn!”
Adam stopped in the doorway of the hotel and exchanged a smile with Birch as Brian Mulcahey tore up to them from somewhere down the block.
He was, Adam noticed immediately and gratefully, wearing new boots.
“I’m surprised you can run in those,” he told the boy. “Ain’t they a little tight, being new and all?”
Brian was puffing a little, and his pale cheeks actually had some color in them from the effort. “They don’t hurt. But they squeak something awful.” He dug into his pocket, still breathing heavily, and the next thing Adam knew, he was plunking two silver dollars into his hand. “I been trying since yesterday to give them to you, but Mr. Birch said on as how you ain’t been here very much.”
“What’s this?”
“My mam said the president was about giving me too much money for only a pair of boots. So here, it’s back. And she liked the pies, and so did little Erin, though she spit out the peas.”
Adam gravely took the coins and slipped them back in his coat pocket, next to the Colt that weighted it down. “Erin’s your little sister? What addles her that she doesn’t like peas?”
Brian shuffled and shrugged. “She’s only four, but she’s a girl. And so I gave them to Bessie. She didn’t care they had Erin’s spit all over ’em. I wonder if inside Bessie’s eggs will be greener now.”
Adam kept his face straight with great effort. Behind the boy, Birch wasn’t quite so successful, guffawing silently.
“And what about you, son? What did you find out about the fancy buggy with the T on it?”
“I followed it yesterday, like you said, until it stopped at one of those shops where they sell lace and ribbons.” Brian didn’t seem any more thrilled about that than he had been about little Erin’s disdain for peas. “Girl things. But a pretty lady got out of the buggy and went inside. While she was being in there looking at lacy things, I got myself up by the driver to look at the horses. Two matching bays—gor, Mr. Quinn, I ain’t ever been seeing none so perfectly matched. I don’t think no one but the groom could tell ’em apart, they were just alike. The same height and everything. I was talking to ’em real nice, like I know how to do, and the driver—he asked me to hold them. He even gave me a penny.”
“A whole penny?” Adam nodded as he spoke, his voice filled with nothing but interest and admiration. “That’s very generous.”
“Aye, he gave me a penny to hold ’em while he went into the pub next block for an ale. Said as how Mrs. Titus would be in the shop buyin’ her frilleries for longer than two ales—but he said he’d only be gone for one, and not to let Silver and Tate get too prancy. That’s what he said—‘prancy.’” Brian’s face screwed up with bafflement over the man’s word choice.
“And so you learned the woman in the landau was Mrs. Titus. I reckon Mr. Titus is represented by the T on the side of the carriage?”
“Oh, aye, sir, Mr. Quinn. When the driver come back—and he was right, he only stayed for one ale, and that Mrs. Titus was still in the shop looking at ribbons and fake flowers.” Brian took no care to hide his disgust over such a waste of time. “And Silver and Tate—the bays—they were so sweet, and they nuzzled on my shoulder, too. I think they liked me. I wished I had an apple core for ’em.”
“Can’t see why they wouldn’t like attention from a polite young man,” Adam replied. He realized that simply speaking with the sunny young man had lifted a bit of the black cloud over his mood. “And when the driver came back . . . ?”
“Aye, when he came back, I remembered what you said about finding out things for Mr. Lincoln. But I didn’t go right out and ask the driver, mister. That wouldn’t have been the right way to go, because he was wearing a—what are they called? A cock . . . cock—a ribbon. Those ribbons like flowers?”
“Cockade,” Adam prompted. At the same time, a thought struck him.
Cockade. Like cockled?
Had that been what the servants at Mr. Billings’s house had overheard during his argument with the visitor—who’d been driving the fancy barouche with the golden T on it? If Billings was an abolitionist, maybe he’d had words with a Southern sympathizer like Titus.
Or . . . cuckold. Titus could just as likely have been yelling at Billings about being cuckolded. Adam really needed to speak to the man and his wife. At least he could gauge their reactions if he was able to question them.
“Aye, that. I saw the driver was wearing one of those cock . . . ades,” Brian said carefully, “they’re about wearing if they don’t like Mr. Lincoln, and so I was thinking because of that, he wouldn’t want to be hearing nothing about Mr. Lincoln. Or nothing nice, anyways. So I wasn’t gonna be saying that name, but I just started talking to the man. And he got talking back to me, just like I wanted, and that’s when I started asking him questions—just as easy as pie.” His grin was wide and very pleased, making his freckles appear to expand in size.
“And what sorts of things did you learn?” Adam was surprisingly impressed by the young boy’s intuitive actions.
“Mrs. Titus, she likes to shop. All the time. Every day.” Again, the disdain was heavy in his words. “Or she likes to visit her friend. At the . . .” He screwed up his face, thinking. “A house place.”
“A house place?”
Birch, who’d been listening, edged closer. “Britton House? Munderly House? Latney House?”
“Oy, that’s it! Latney House.”
Birch glanced at Adam knowingly, but spoke to Brian. “That’s like a resting house. A hotel. Not so fine as the Willard, though, there, boy.”
A hotel. Annabelle Titus visited her friend at a hotel. “Did the groom say anything about Mrs. Titus’s friend? Anything at all?”
“No, sir.”
“What about Mrs. Titus? Did her groom say anything about maybe her being sad yesterday, or upset?” If Annabelle Titus had been romantically involved with Custer Billings, Adam reckoned she might not be feeling herself today. Especially if her husband had gotten involved.
“He didn’t say nothing about that. But I did see her holding a handkerchief at her face in the carriage. And Mr. Titus, he makes a lot of money. They’re rich—rich as kings! And they live over on Third Street. I saw the house. Gor, it’s big!”
“You followed the carriage all the way to the Tituses’ home?”
“No, I wasn’t about doing that—waiting around for them. I walked over and looked for it m’self. Mrs. Titus was still shopping.”
Adam hid a grin. “Very nice work, there, young sir.” He handed Brian a half-dollar coin. “You come back here again tomorrow at noon, and we’ll see what else I might have for you to do.”
“For Mr. Lincoln?”
“That’s right. Now take that home to your mam and practice your reading and writing tonight. Someday, I reckon it’ll come in handy. Mr. Lincoln’s mother also taught him to read, you know, and he puts great store by anyone who takes the time and energy to learn his schoolwork.”
“Gor. His mother taught him too? Wait’ll I tell my mam!”
Adam watched him dash helter-skelter down the block, then turned to Birch.
The older man was smiling fondly, looking between both of them. “He’s one hell of a firecracker, that kid,” he said in his grating voice. “I think you picked a live one there, sir.”
“You’re telling me. As it’s almost six o’clock, I reckon I’ll see you tomorrow morning, Birch.” He started, then turned back. “You ever hear of a newspaper called the District Herald?”
The doorman thought for a moment. “Can’t say as I have, Mr. Quinn.”
Adam frowned. “No one seems to know it. I’ve been asking around all day. I begin to wonder if it even exists.”
“There’s lots of papers in Washington,” Birch said. “And some of ’em are even real.” He laughed, the corners of his eyes and mouth crinkling.
Adam went upstairs and was hardly through the door to his hotel room when he was shrugging out of his coat.
“You’re back.”
He looked over to see his uncle standing next to the bed. He had an open carpetbag sitting there and appeared to be packing.
“You going somewhere?” Adam asked, dragging off his shirt and tossing it onto a chair. With nimble fingers, he flipped open the fastening for the wide harness-like strap that went around his chest and under his good arm, giving a soft groan of relief when the prosthetic’s tight binding released.
“That’s how your aunt sounds when she unlaces her corset.” Joshua glanced over, grinning. “Or when I do it for her. Says it’s the first time all day she can take in a full breath.” His expression was filled with affection.
Fresh air cooled Adam’s skin, and as he unbuckled the rest of the bindings, the wooden arm fell away from its tight position. He sighed again and rubbed the end of his stump and the upper part of his arm because it felt good.
As he did so, he mused on what his uncle had just said, for it hadn’t really struck Adam how much more strictly women had to be bound: through their entire rib cage, and then shaped into an hourglass form. He reckoned that must be worse than to have a few straps around his upper torso and upper arm, no matter how uncomfortable wearing a prosthetic was. He could choose to go without wearing his contraption at any time, but for a woman to do so would be quite unusual. Though, he guessed, out on the frontier maybe they were more lenient about fashion. He’d not really had the opportunity to find out.
With that in mind, he reckoned he could maybe understand a lady’s desire to dress as a man.
As he rubbed a lavender-scented salve on the scarred, rounded end of his stump, he looked meaningfully at Joshua’s bag and asked again, “Where are you going?”
“Back home.”
“Home? To Springfield?”
Joshua lifted a brow. “Yes. I can’t stay here forever. I’ve got a store to run and a wife to manage. I’ve been away from your Aunt Sarah for far too long. She’s getting impatient, and her time is coming near as well. I have to be home before the baby arrives.”
Adam smiled in return, but at the same time he was aware of a gentle pang of something painful deep in his gut. “I reckon I’m ready to go home too. I just . . . I don’t reckon I know where home is anymore. I thought it was Lawrence, but now . . .”
His uncle paused in his packing and looked at him with quiet understanding. “I know it’s been a difficult two years for you since all that ugliness with Tom and Mary and Carl—and your arm. That’s why I thought it would be worthwhile for you to help Abe these last few months—and now here in Washington. I hoped it would give you time to think about what you want to do and where you want to go.”
Adam gave a short, bitter laugh. “I still don’t know that. Nothing seems to hold much appeal. There’s always California. Or Colorado.”
Somewhere away from people and city and politics.
Joshua nodded. “You’ll figure it out. Eventually.”
Adam replaced the top to the tin of salve, frowning. “I don’t want to stay here in the city, Uncle Josh.”
“I’m sorry to hear you say that. I’d stay if I could, just to be near Abe. To support him, protect him. He’s . . .” He shook his head, a grim, humorless smile flattening his lips. “Hell, he’s the smartest man I know, but he’s got an open heart that’s far too trusting sometimes. He’s going to need people he can trust—but, more importantly, people who don’t want or need anything from him. You—and I—are two of the few who can say that.”
“Damn, but you’re right about that,” Adam muttered. “The last thing I’d ever want is a job in politics or with the government—or even in the damned city.” Only now that he’d relieved the stress on his half-arm did he turn to the next best thing: removing his boots and stockings.
“You also have a task that’s been given to you,” Joshua said, stuffing a waistcoat into his carpetbag. “I don’t suppose you’re going to leave until you’ve finished that, will you, Adam?”
“No, of course not.” Especially now that there was a second death laid on the doorstep.
Yet, he felt a pang of uncertainty. What if he never solved the murders? Everything seemed so murky, and his brain was filled with a lot o
f disparate pieces of information, snatches of conversation, and what felt like an infinite number of solutions . . . and none at all.
“Well, you’d best get washed up and dressed or we’ll be late,” Joshua said matter-of-factly.
“Late? For what?”
“For supper. At the President’s House. Oh, you must have been gone when he mentioned it. We’re both expected to attend. And there’s to be a levee—a reception—Friday night, so you’d best plan on that as well. It’s Mary’s doing, of course,” Joshua added without a hint of inflection in his voice. “I, of course, will be halfway to Springfield by then.”
Adam looked grimly at the wooden limb from which he’d just freed himself. “What time are we expected tonight?”
“Seven.”
A glance at the clock on the fireplace mantel told him he had slightly more than an hour before supper. It would take less than fifteen minutes to walk to the President’s House. That gave him more than thirty minutes to close his eyes and think—as well as a breather for his arm. He might even doze off.
“If I’m not up, wake me at half past six,” he told his uncle, and laid full out on his narrow bed. “I’ll be ready to leave on time.”
Though the end of the mattress cut into him midcalf, leaving his bare feet dangling, he was used to being too tall for most beds and that didn’t keep him from drifting off into a light doze as images and voices from his day accompanied him.
His dreams were permeated by thoughts of blue-stoned daggers and oil-patch footprints, ladies dressed as men with bristling mustaches and house-wide hoopskirts, . . . and a hen with a fondness for peas that laid green-tinged eggs.
And murder.
Blood. Violence. The wide, shocked eyes of Custer Billings as someone thrust a dagger into his belly. His mouth gasping silently, his body shuddering and jolting at the force of the attack.
It was someone close. Someone who moved toward the victim, walking into an embrace or to shake his hand. Someone who came near enough to be able to maneuver a weapon so quickly and precisely that the man had no time to react, to step back or hold up his hands in defense.... But he did hold up his hands, and with a vicious swipe, the murderer used his dagger to slice off not his hand, but his entire arm.
Murder in the Lincoln White House Page 18