City of Lies

by Victoria Thompson

  “Then I’ll have to try a legal maneuver.”

  “Could you get a writ?”

  “You mean a writ of habeas corpus?” Mrs. Stevens asked.

  “Yes, that’s about the only thing that would work,” O’Brien said. “At least it would force the warden to produce the prisoners so we can judge their condition and determine the legalities of their imprisonment.”

  “You’ll need to find a friendly judge,” Gideon said.

  Mrs. Stevens smiled. “I’m guessing any Republican judge would be glad to help if it will embarrass the president.”

  “I hope you’re right, Mrs. Stevens,” O’Brien said. “In any case, it is our best hope at the moment.”

  “If you’re going back to Virginia, Mr. O’Brien, I know of two ladies who would like to go with you,” Mrs. Stevens said. “Mrs. Young is concerned about her daughter, and Miss Morey wants to see her mother.”

  “Is that wise? I don’t know what I’ll be facing when I get down there.”

  “It’s not a bad idea to take them along,” Gideon said. “They might let the women in for a visit where they’d refuse you.”

  “He’s right, they may,” Mrs. Stevens said.

  “But if I have to find a judge, I wouldn’t feel comfortable leaving them on their own down there,” O’Brien said.

  “I’d be happy to go along,” Gideon said. “Then you wouldn’t have to worry about leaving them alone.”

  “That’s very generous of you, Mr. Bates,” Mrs. Stevens said.

  “Not at all. My own mother is in that place, and a young friend is with her.”

  O’Brien nodded. “It’s settled, then. Tell the ladies to meet us at Union Station at eight tomorrow morning. And wish us luck.”

  • • •

  Elizabeth rolled over, trying without success to find a comfortable spot on the narrow cot. Exhausted from her nearly sleepless night and then sitting at a sewing machine most of the day, she realized that even her bones ached. She thought she’d fall asleep immediately when the guard had finally turned out the lights in the ward. Unfortunately, her stomach kept reminding her of how little she’d eaten that day. She’d hardly been able to swallow any of the rancid, nearly raw pork and weevil-infested cornbread they’d served for supper, the only real meal of that long day. Even worse, she could still hear the guard calling out the name Betty Perkins, which meant Thornton knew exactly where she was and would be waiting for her whenever she was released. When she closed her eyes, she could still see Thornton’s thugs beating Jake. Had Coleman gotten there in time to save him? And if he hadn’t, how would she ever face the Old Man again? Of course, if Thornton got to her first, she wouldn’t be facing anyone.

  Her head pounding from hunger and terror and guilt, she punched the lumpy pillow and tried rolling over again. She’d just settled when she heard an odd, mewling sound coming from Anna’s cot.

  “Are you all right?” she whispered.

  “I . . . I’m so afraid.”

  Elizabeth sighed. “No one’s going to bother you tonight.”

  “How do you know?” Her voice broke on a sob.

  “Stop crying! You don’t want the guard to hear you.” No telling what torments those harpies might dream up if they knew Anna was so frightened.

  “I . . . I can’t!”

  “You have to!”

  She sobbed again. “Can I . . . Can I come over there?”

  Elizabeth swallowed a groan. At least she’d be warmer with Anna in the bed. “Yes, but be quiet! Don’t draw the guard’s attention.”

  A rustle of cloth, and then she was sliding beneath the blanket. After a few moments of wiggling and rearranging, they were spooned together with Anna’s back tucked against her.

  The girl’s slender body shuddered with one last sob. “Thank you so much.”

  “Don’t thank me. I just wanted to shut you up so I could go to sleep.”

  Anna giggled. “You’re so funny.”

  Elizabeth rolled her eyes in the darkness.

  “I wish I could be like you.”

  “No, you don’t. Go to sleep.”

  “I want to be strong. That’s why I came to Washington with Mrs. Bates. She was the strongest woman I knew, until I met you. You’re strong in a different way than Mrs. Bates, and I want to be like that.”

  Elizabeth didn’t want to know what that meant. “What about your mother? Isn’t she a suffragette, too?”

  “It’s ‘suffragist.’”

  “What?”

  “The term ‘suffragette’ is demeaning. We call ourselves ‘suffragists.’”

  “Oh.” Elizabeth hoped she hadn’t revealed her ignorance. There was a lot she didn’t know about this business. “So isn’t your mother a suffragist?”

  “Not really, not like Mrs. Bates. She’d never march or anything. Oh, she wants things to change, for my sake, she says. She wants me to have an easier time of it. The world is a dangerous place for women.”

  How well Elizabeth knew. “Do you think getting the right to vote will change that?”

  “Men will have to take us seriously then, won’t they? It’s not just the vote, you know. Women hardly have any rights at all. Legally, I mean. When my father died, he left everything to my brother. If David decided to put my mother and me out on the street, he could do it. We don’t own anything, not even the clothes on our backs. What would become of us then?”

  “You’d get a job, I expect.”

  “Doing what?”

  What indeed? Anna gave no evidence of being able to fend for herself. “If you ever learn to run that sewing machine, you could do that.”

  Anna’s body shook with suppressed laughter. “I’m better at it than you!”

  Elizabeth recalled her trials today with the mechanical beast. Most of the other women knew how to sew, but Elizabeth had never felt the need to learn. “That’s nothing to brag about.”

  “Which just goes to prove how hard it would be to make my own living. Girls don’t get paid as much as men, either, even for doing the same job. I could never earn enough to keep myself and Mother, too.”

  She was right, of course, and Elizabeth didn’t want to work in a factory any more than Anna did. That’s why she’d convinced the Old Man to teach her all he knew, so she’d never have to worry about it. “I guess getting the vote will change all that.”

  “Of course it will. I heard Mrs. Pankhurst speak, and she explained it.”

  Elizabeth didn’t know who Mrs. Pankhurst was, but she figured any self-respecting suffragist would, so she didn’t ask. “What did she say?”

  “It’s all about the laws. Politicians make the laws, and they have to please the people who vote for them, so they make laws to benefit the voters, who are all men. Women don’t vote, so they don’t have to pay attention to what we want. If we could vote, though, they’d have to pay attention, and they’d have to pass the laws we want.”

  Elizabeth thought the reasoning was a little naïve. This Mrs. Pankhurst obviously didn’t understand that there was more to politics than pleasing voters. You could lie to voters, but you really had to come through for the rich people. Being a successful politician cost a lot of money, and rich people expected a good return on their investments. Still, getting the vote might give women an edge they didn’t have now. At least it couldn’t hurt. She’d have to revise her opinion of the suffragists. Maybe they weren’t completely wasting their time.

  “You need to get some sleep,” Elizabeth said. “Tomorrow will be just as bad as today.”

  “Do you think so?”

  She knew so, but she said, “No, probably not, because we won’t have to see Whittaker before breakfast tomorrow.”

  Anna giggled again. “You’re so funny.”

  “Go to sleep.”

  • • •

  Gideon couldn’t
ever remember being so angry. Or so frustrated. He paced the small room again, glaring at the armed guard, who seemed more amused than annoyed by his behavior. Which was probably a good thing. He was armed after all.

  “Please, Mr. Bates,” Mrs. Young said. “You’ll exhaust yourself.”

  She and Miss Morey were sitting at a table, the only real furniture in what had been the parlor of this house. They were, according to the guard, a mile or so from the workhouse, but they had been allowed no nearer. When they’d been denied entry, O’Brien had gone in search of a cooperative judge and a court order to allow him to see the prisoners. That had been hours ago.

  “I’m sorry, Mrs. Young,” Gideon said, remembering the manners his mother had drilled into him since birth. “I didn’t mean to distress you.”

  “Nothing you do would distress me under the circumstances, Mr. Bates,” she said with a sad smile. “It was so kind of you to come with us today to look after Miss Morey and me.”

  Gideon hadn’t done it out of kindness, but he could at least do a little more to look after the ladies. “Aren’t you going to offer the ladies something to eat?” Gideon asked their scruffy-looking keeper.

  “If I had anything to offer them, I’d eat it myself,” he said quite reasonably, which only irritated Gideon more. “Why don’t you folks let me take you back to the train station so you can go home? Mr. Whittaker ain’t never going to let you in to see your people.”

  “He’ll have to when Mr. O’Brien gets the court order,” Miss Morey said. She had been remarkably calm throughout the ordeal, much to Gideon’s relief. Both women, in fact, had taken their situation far better than he. The suffragists, he’d noticed, tended to be sensible women not given to emotional outbursts, no matter what the newspapers claimed.

  “If we don’t get in to see them today,” Mrs. Young said, “I’ll make sure Mr. Tumulty knows about it.”

  “Who’s that?” Gideon asked.

  “He’s President Wilson’s personal secretary and an old family friend. He’s known my daughter, Tilly, since she was an infant. Surely, he’ll be as upset as I when he hears how we’ve been treated and what’s happened to Tilly and the other prisoners.”

  Gideon could hardly believe she’d allowed such a valuable contact to go unused. “Why didn’t you go to him first?” Gideon asked.

  Mrs. Young dropped her gaze, and Miss Morey frowned at her. “She did.”

  “He has no idea this is happening, I’m sure,” Mrs. Young said a bit defensively.

  Miss Morey did not acknowledge her remark. She said to Gideon, “He told her all the reports about the poor conditions at the workhouse are exaggerated. He said the prisoners are very comfortable there, and she shouldn’t worry about her daughter.”

  “Tilly wasn’t dressed warmly enough,” Mrs. Young said. “I just wanted to bring her some heavier clothes.”

  “You must realize by now that everything he told you was a lie,” Miss Morey said.

  “I’ll be certain to point that out to him when I see him again,” Mrs. Young said with some asperity.

  “Looks like your friend is finally coming back,” the guard said, peering out the front window.

  Gideon and the two women hurried to meet O’Brien at the door.

  • • •

  Elizabeth couldn’t remember why the idea of a walk had sounded so appealing. After a breakfast of wormy mush, skim milk and greasy coffee too bitter to drink, they’d been put to work sewing underwear for the male inmates again. Then came a lunch of split pea soup made from peas that had not actually been cooked, and before they went back to the sewing room, Matron Herndon had invited a few of the ladies for an afternoon stroll. Elizabeth should have known better.

  The woods surrounding the workhouse were stark and leafless, but being outside was a welcome change. At first the cold air had invigorated her, or maybe it was just being away from the stench of the workhouse, but they hadn’t gone far before Elizabeth had to stop. Leaning over, hands on her knees, she gasped for breath. The cold air seared her lungs, and her head swam. What on earth was wrong with her?

  Two days without proper food had already taken a toll, and not just on her. The others had stopped, too, leaning against the damp tree trunks or each other. They all looked unnaturally pale and drawn, making Elizabeth glad she didn’t have access to a mirror herself.

  “Is this the best you can do?” Herndon said the third time the women stopped, gasping and panting. “I don’t know how you suffs manage to walk around the White House if you can’t walk a few steps in the woods.”

  Luckily, Elizabeth was too weak to do what she really wanted to do. She would have ended up at the workhouse for the rest of her life.

  “I don’t think I can walk another step,” Anna said. “What will she do to me if I can’t go on?”

  Before Elizabeth could answer, an eerie howl drifted to them through the trees. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up.

  “What’s that?” someone asked.

  Herndon grinned. “That’s the hounds. Somebody must’ve escaped. We’d better hurry and get back.”

  “Will the dogs attack us?” Miss Findeisen asked. She was one of the younger women, and she obviously came from money, if Elizabeth could judge from her boldness in daring to address Herndon.

  Herndon nodded, as if acknowledging an especially astute question. “That’s exactly what they’ll do.”

  The baying grew louder. Elizabeth saw her own terror reflected on Anna’s face and took her arm.

  “Come on.”

  Every muscle screamed in protest, but she forced her weary body to move. She needed to escape, but she couldn’t leave the rest of them behind. Not bothering to ask herself why she should care, she poked and prodded the others.

  “Let’s go. We have to get back.”

  “I can’t,” Anna said.

  “You have to.” She gave her a shove to get her moving.

  She’d heard what dogs could do, and even though she didn’t think Whittaker would dare let the suffragists get mauled, she wasn’t sure Mrs. Herndon cared one way or the other.

  With Anna moving, Elizabeth herded the rest of them in behind her. One woman started to protest, but something in Elizabeth’s expression stopped her, and she fell into step with the others.

  Too weak, she couldn’t run, even though every instinct demanded it. Stumbling and staggering and driven by the haunting wail of the dogs as they searched for their prey, Elizabeth moved forward, sometimes leading, sometimes following, as the others made their own uncertain way. Half falling, she felt a hand on her arm, reaching out to help. Her gaze locked for a second with a woman whose name she did not know.

  “Careful,” she said.

  “Thank you,” Elizabeth said. Words she rarely used and seldom meant.

  The hounds were louder, closer now, their baying like echoes out of hell.

  Miss Findeisen stumbled, trying to hurry, and Elizabeth caught her arm. “Careful,” she said.

  Miss Findeisen smiled weakly.

  Anna staggered and nearly fell. “I can’t go on,” she sobbed, slumping against a tree.

  Elizabeth grabbed her arm. “You have to. The dogs will tear you to pieces.”

  Her eyes widened, but she didn’t move.

  Desperate, Elizabeth pulled Anna’s arm over her shoulders. “Lean on me.”

  “You can’t carry me!”

  “We can do it together,” Miss Findeisen said, taking Anna’s other arm.

  They lurched off, half dragging, half carrying her. Elizabeth’s lungs burned with each breath and all her muscles screamed in agony at every step, but still she put one foot in front of the other over and over until her legs at last refused and her knees buckled. But someone caught her and took Anna’s weight from her shoulders, and someone else linked arms with her, urging her on.

  Bre
athless and terrified and nearly hysterical, clinging to each other until no one knew who was really helping whom, they finally staggered back to the hideous safety of the workhouse. Only when they reached the familiar sewing room could Elizabeth be certain the baying of the hounds was now just an echo in her head.

  Elizabeth and the other six women who had been out with her collapsed onto their chairs at the sewing machines, unable to do anything but gasp for breath. After what seemed an age, when she could breathe almost normally again and finally became aware of her surroundings, she sensed a current of unease that had nothing to do with their return.

  The women who had stayed behind were stiff and silent, their eyes guarded, their lips pursed.

  “What happened?” Elizabeth asked the one nearest her.

  The woman glanced around to make sure no guard was near. “They took Miss Burns.”

  Elizabeth looked around, too. Sure enough, the woman with the fiery red hair was nowhere in sight. “Where?”

  “No talking!” the guard called from across the room.

  Elizabeth muttered a curse.

  She had to wait until after supper to find out. In the last hour before they went to bed, the women were herded into the large “recreation” room and allowed some time to socialize. Weary beyond bearing, they all sought the chairs placed around the edges of the room and sat in numbed silence.

  The regular prisoners were there, too, the ones wearing rags so the suffragists could have the “nicer” clothes. They sat in clusters apart from the suffragists, talking and picking nits out of each other’s hair.

  Elizabeth found Mrs. Bates and sank onto the floor beside her chair because the chairs beside her were already taken. “What happened to Miss Burns?”

  “She asked to see Whittaker. She wanted to repeat her demands that we be treated like political prisoners. He came into the sewing room and . . .” Mrs. Bates shuddered at the memory. “He came in furious. I’m not sure why he was already so angry, but he just wanted to know what nonsense—that’s the word he used—what nonsense Miss Burns had to say now. She told him she wanted to see an attorney and find out the status of our case, but he told her to shut up or he’d put her in a straitjacket and a buckle gag.”