City of Lies

by Victoria Thompson

  “David,” Gideon said patiently, “Whittaker couldn’t release the women even if he wanted to, and we have no reason to think he does. He is bound by the law to keep them until ordered to do otherwise by a judge. That’s why we need to get him to court.” He turned to Thornton. “We do need to get him back to Virginia. What have your men found out about him?”

  Thornton gave the men an impatient glance and said, “Just that he lives not far from the prison and he hasn’t been home in days.”

  “Does he have family?”

  “A wife.”

  “Good. She’s going to send him a telegram telling him . . .” He gazed off into the distance, considering the possibilities.

  “Why would she send him a telegram?” David asked.

  “She wouldn’t,” Thornton snapped. “We’d send a telegram and sign her name.”

  “Oh, I see. Yes, of course. We could tell him she’s sick or something.”

  Thornton seemed a little shocked by David’s lack of insight. Apparently, he didn’t really know him very well.

  “And do we just hope Whittaker cares enough about his wife to go rushing home?” Gideon said. “Would that bring you rushing home, Thornton?”

  Thornton smiled grimly. “Not if the president of the United States wanted me to stay in hiding.”

  “I think Whittaker would agree,” Gideon said. “Maybe the president will send him a telegram instead.”

  This earned him a nod of approval from Thornton, but David said, “Does the president send people telegrams?”

  “No, but I’ll bet his secretary does,” Gideon said. “And I just happen to know his name.”

  • • •

  Don’t throw up. Don’t throw up. Deep breaths.

  Air had never smelled so sweet, even the foul air of the dispensary. She wanted to tell Anna how happy she was to breathe, but she couldn’t speak yet. Her throat burned and her jaws ached and every muscle in her body throbbed.

  Don’t throw up. They’ll just do it again. The others had told her. Deep breaths.

  The mess they’d poured down her throat lay like lead in her stomach. She tasted the sharpness of iron. Blood, she knew, seeping from the cuts in her mouth. She probed them gingerly with her tongue, testing each one, teasing the ragged skin and savoring the delicious twinge of pain because it proved she was alive.

  “Elizabeth?”

  She opened her eyes. Anna’s wasted face came into focus. Elizabeth smiled to show she was all right.

  “Miss Miles?”

  Elizabeth flinched at the sound of his voice, but when she looked into his face, she saw the kindness again. She was lucky to get him, they’d told her. The other doctor enjoyed hurting the women.

  “How are you feeling?” Dr. Stanislov asked.

  “Terrible,” she croaked, or tried to.

  “I know that is not a pleasant experience, but we have no choice. We cannot allow you ladies to die.”

  Just what Mrs. Bates had told her.

  “I must tell you how much I admire your dedication,” he said, his dark eyes moist. “I would never have believed American women could care so much for freedom. I have seen women in Russia suffer for their ideals, but if I had not seen this with my own eyes, I would not have believed it.”

  “Do women in Russia go to prison?” Anna asked.

  “Yes, my own sister did, when she would not betray her friends. Her friends were wanted by the government. She went on a hunger strike, too. They fed her after three days, but you women have been striking for almost a week.”

  “Doctor,” one of the nurses called, and he hurried away.

  “They took Lucy Burns and Mrs. Lewis away yesterday,” Anna said.

  “Where—” Her ravaged throat convulsed, silencing her.

  “They don’t tell us anything, but they were very sick, so maybe a hospital.”

  Anna needed to go to a hospital. Where was Mrs. Bates? She’d make Anna eat.

  Her stomach roiled, and she swallowed hard, ignoring the searing agony.

  Don’t throw up. Deep breaths.

  • • •

  Gideon pretended to gaze out the train window at the passing scenery, but it was far too dark to see anything. Instead, he watched the reflection of the man he was learning to hate.

  Warden Whittaker sat across the aisle of the railcar reading a newspaper but making little progress. He’d actually spent most of his energy tapping his foot and checking his pocket watch.

  Gideon hated his ugly face and the spiderlike birthmark on his temple and his stubby hands and his fat feet. He wanted to slam Whittaker’s ugly face into the train window and find out exactly how many times he’d have to do it before the glass shattered.

  How fortuitous that his new friend, Mrs. Young, knew President Wilson’s secretary so well. Mr. Tumulty’s message urging Whittaker to return to Virginia at once had worked beautifully. The only problem had been convincing Thornton’s henchmen that he didn’t need their help following Whittaker from the hotel to the train station. They’d finally agreed that the dumb one, Fletcher, would wait at the station with Deputy Klink, and Lester would accompany Gideon. Two men having a conversation on a street corner wouldn’t attract much attention, and so Whittaker had rushed right past them in front of his hotel in his search for a cab.

  On the train, he’d split Lester and Fletcher up, one in the car ahead and the other in the car behind with Deputy Klink. Gideon didn’t trust any of them not to betray themselves during what had begun to feel like the longest train ride in history. Finally, the conductor came bustling through to announce their stop. Gideon waited until Whittaker rose and started for the end of the car, then followed at a discreet distance.

  When the train had rolled to a stop and the conductor released them, Fletcher came out of the car to his left, and Deputy Klink and Lester descended from the one on his right. A lone wagon stood outside the station, ready to transport any late travelers to their final destinations, its driver slumped inside his overcoat against the evening chill.

  Whittaker hurried toward it, but Klink stepped in his path. “Say, ain’t you Warden Whittaker, from Occoquan?” he asked pleasantly.

  “What’s it to you?” the hideous little man snapped.

  “’Cause if you are, I’ve got something for you.”

  Before Whittaker could blink, Klink slapped the writ into Whittaker’s stubby little fingers.

  “That’s a warrant, Mr. Whittaker, and you’ve been served. You’ve got to show up at court tomorrow to see the judge. Oh, and you’ve got to produce your prisoners, too.”

  “Why, you son of a—”

  “All forty of them,” Gideon said.

  Whittaker whirled to face him, and then he saw Fletcher and Lester and his beady little eyes widened in fear. “What’s going on here?”

  “We just want to make sure you understand,” Gideon said. “That’s a writ of habeas corpus, and we’d better see you at the courthouse tomorrow with all of your suffragist prisoners.”

  “And who do you think you are?”

  “I’m an attorney for the Woman’s Party, and if you aren’t there, I’ll make sure you’re charged and arrested. I wonder how the guards would like to have you as a prisoner in your own workhouse, Whittaker.”

  Whittaker cursed them roundly, questioning the legitimacy of their birth and their ancestral heritage in terms Gideon had seldom heard outside of a saloon. He was so annoyed that he didn’t offer to share the wagon with Gideon when they left the station.

  • • •

  The clanging of metal bedpans jarred Elizabeth awake. Disoriented, she needed a minute to remember where she was.

  “Get up,” a nurse said. “You’re going to court today.”

  She tried to say, “Court?” but her throat rebelled, and the word came out a croak.

  �
��Court!” Anna said. “I knew it! The hunger strike worked.”

  The hunger strike or the lawyers. Elizabeth’s money was on the lawyers. She pushed herself up to see what was going on. The nurses scurried around, prodding the women awake and urging them to get up. Some inmates came in carrying bundles that proved to be sacks containing the prisoners’ personal belongings. They were, it seemed, to dress in their own clothes for court.

  Still weak, Elizabeth eased her legs off the bed and gingerly tried to stand. Oddly, she felt a little better than she had yesterday. Much as she hated to think it, the force-feeding had done her some good after all. A nurse plunked one of the sacks onto her bed, and she saw it bore a tag with Elizabeth Miles scrawled on it.

  Apprehension shivered over her. Would it still be there? The money she’d sewn into her corset? The Old Man had taught her that. Always keep a stash for an emergency. If nobody had found it, she would be all right. She could get to New York and pick up her share of the Thornton score from the Old Man. She’d have to answer for what had happened to Jake, but she’d face that when she had to. First, she had to get out of here and make sure Thornton didn’t find her.

  She pulled open the bag and emptied it onto the bed. Everything was there. She wouldn’t check for the money. No telling who might be watching. She glanced over to see how Anna was doing and found her struggling to sit up.

  “Don’t move!” The words snagged in her ragged throat, but she forced them out. “Let me get dressed and then I’ll help you.”

  “I don’t want to be a bother.”

  Elizabeth just glared at her until she slumped back down onto the bed obediently. Satisfied Anna would wait, she started stripping off her prison clothes. Without any obvious searching, she managed to find the hidden pocket inside her corset and felt the reassuring crinkle of banknotes. Relief flooded her. She’d be all right now. She just had to make a plan.

  The other women were also trying to dress, with varying degrees of success, depending on how debilitated they were. Some, like Anna, couldn’t even sit up. Those who were able dressed themselves and then helped the others. Ella Findeisen came over to assist her with Anna. The poor girl could hardly move her limbs. She was so thin, Elizabeth wondered why Anna’s bones didn’t break right through her skin. She already had open sores on her elbows and heels from shifting on the rough sheets.

  Ella caught her eye at one point and whispered, “She won’t be able to walk.”

  Elizabeth nodded, wondering how they could possibly even get her out of the bed.

  But they needn’t have worried. When the time came, those who couldn’t walk were strapped onto stretchers and carried out to the waiting wagons. The rest of them straggled out, weak and weary but still avidly searching for the friends from whom they’d been separated. Elizabeth scanned the faces of the women climbing into the wagons. She saw Mrs. Bates, but her wagon pulled away before she could get to her. At least she was well. Elizabeth would find her when they got to the courthouse.

  She would have to be clever, especially now because she wasn’t strong. The judge might release them, and if he did, the news probably wouldn’t hit the newspapers until tomorrow. That would give her a head start on Thornton and his thugs, at least. But she wasn’t sure she was strong enough to get to New York without help. She’d have a much better chance if she could have a few days to rest up first. Was it too much to hope that the judge wouldn’t release them at all? That something would happen so they could end the hunger strike but stay in jail for a while to recover? Probably. So she’d have to figure out something herself, some way to get herself to New York ahead of Thornton so he wouldn’t kill her like he’d probably killed Jake.

  That shouldn’t be so hard, should it?

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Gideon had been waiting on the courthouse steps with David for what seemed like hours. He hadn’t known waiting could actually be painful. He’d paced and stood still and even tried to make conversation with David. None of that had been able to distract him from the awful anticipation or relieve the knot of tension burning in his chest. Would Anna and his mother really be released today? And even if they were, what condition would they be in? He had no doubt his mother would have joined the hunger strike, but what about Anna? She’d always been so frail. David was nearly frantic with worry. They both knew she wouldn’t be able to survive for long without food.

  Then, finally, something changed. He couldn’t have said what it was. Perhaps just some sixth sense had warned him, but this time when he looked down the street, he knew they were coming. Indeed, only a few seconds later the first of the wagons came into view.

  “They’re here,” he told David, then shouted it so they could hear him inside the courthouse.

  O’Brien came rushing out. “Thank God,” he muttered as they waited on the steps while the wagons drew up, then hurried down to meet the women.

  Gideon searched each face as they climbed down, but his mother wasn’t in the first group, and neither was Anna.

  “Dear heaven,” David breathed beside him. “Look at them.”

  He was looking at them, and what he saw horrified him—haggard faces, sunken eyes, bodies moving carefully, as if they’d aged decades in only weeks.

  Fear roiled in him like a poisonous snake. Where were they?

  The next wagon rumbled to a stop, and once again he searched each face, trying not to register how emaciated they were, looking only for the blessed one that had kissed him every night for his entire childhood. Where could she be?

  “Gideon!”

  He looked again and even then almost didn’t recognize her. “Mother?” His heart lurched.

  He lunged for her, but a billy club caught him in the chest. Pain exploded along with rage.

  “You can’t touch the prisoners,” a burly guard informed him, shoving him out of the way.

  He would have shoved him back, but O’Brien grabbed his arm. “Don’t be a fool! He’ll crack your skull open, and what good will you be to us then?”

  “Mrs. Bates, where’s Anna?” David called.

  “I don’t know,” she managed before the guard shouted, “No talking!” and herded the women up the courthouse steps.

  Gideon watched her go, not certain if he felt any relief at all from seeing her when she looked so awful.

  “What does she mean, she doesn’t know?” David asked of no one in particular.

  “She was in the infirmary,” one of the other women managed before the guard silenced her as well.

  Two more wagons had arrived, and if Gideon thought the other women looked ill, these women looked to be at death’s door. The guards had to assist them getting down, and even when they were on the ground, they had to cling to each other for strength. Their pale faces and haunted eyes told of suffering he could only imagine.

  “This must be the group from the infirmary,” he told David.

  “Then where is she?”

  Only a few women were on the final wagon, or at least that’s what Gideon thought at first, seeing only a half dozen heads visible above the sides and none of them Anna’s. Those women climbed down with difficulty, and then a couple of the guards climbed up and started handing down stretchers.

  Stretchers?

  “Are they dead?” David asked wildly when they realized there were women strapped to the stretchers.

  “They can’t be dead,” Gideon insisted, although the words were more a prayer than a certainty.

  “Anna!” David cried, hurrying over to where the guards were carrying the first of the stretchers away from the wagon and up the courthouse steps. Gideon was close behind.

  One of the women who’d climbed down on her own looked up at David’s shout. “She’s here.”

  Gideon had never seen this woman before, he was sure. He would have remembered. Her startling blue eyes took them both in as they reached the stretcher that had just
been handed down.

  “No talking to the prisoners,” one of the guards told them, but neither of them paid him any mind.

  Gideon looked at the shrunken figure strapped to the stretcher. She did look dead. Her eyes were closed and her face stark white.

  “Anna?” David reached out but a guard blocked him.

  “She’s all right,” the blue-eyed girl said. “Or she will be.”

  A guard shoved her. “No talking!”

  Fury blossomed in her wonderful eyes, but she didn’t spare the guard so much as a glance. “You’re David,” she said.

  This time she ducked out of the way and the guard pushed thin air.

  “Yes, her brother,” he replied.

  She simply nodded and went on, following Anna’s stretcher up the steps.

  The guards lowered another stretcher, and Gideon pulled David out of the way. “Who is that girl?”

  David shook his head. “I never saw her before.”

  “Go after them. See if they’ll let you talk to Anna,” Gideon said. “I’ll wait here until all the women are inside.”

  Luckily, there were only a few women on stretchers. They all seemed to be alive, too. Some even smiled weakly when he checked each of them. They wouldn’t be alive much longer if they didn’t end the hunger strike, though. He was certain of that.

  By the time he got inside, the courtroom was in chaos. The women from the first wagons were trying to learn the welfare of those who had apparently been confined in the infirmary, and all of the women wanted to check on the women on the stretchers, in spite of the guards’ attempts to silence them all and get them seated.

  When Gideon located his mother in the crowd, she was embracing the girl with the amazing eyes, and the look on his mother’s face told him how much the girl meant to her. She must be one of the leaders of the movement. How strange he’d never seen her before.

  His mother released the girl and bent down to check on Anna, whose stretcher lay at their feet. David called out to them from where the spectators were being contained on the other side of the room, but she must not have heard him over the din.