Alias Mrs Jones

by Kate McLachlan

  “When is your next train to Hillyard?”

  “Let’s see, we got one going south at ten to seven. Sixty-five cents. You want a ticket?”

  I looked at the clock. It was twenty after six. I smiled. “Yes, thank you.”

  Thirty minutes later the train steamed out of Newport. I sat by a window, my bare head leaning against the glass pane, and watched our progress back through Scotia, Elk, Milan, Chattaroy. Soon I would be home. It was Sunday. I could go to my room, curl up in my bed, and sleep the entire day away. I closed my eyes and dozed, dreaming about sleep.

  Chapter Nineteen

  MARSHAL MITCHELL MET my train. I didn’t expect that. I stopped at the top of the steps, blocking the passengers behind me. He grabbed me about my waist and hauled me down.

  “I thought you might be stupid enough to come back here,” he said.

  “What do you mean?” I was befuddled with weariness and thought I must not have heard correctly. He took my arm and drew me away from the depot. “Wait.” I stopped my boots. “Where are you going? I want to go home.”

  “No.” He didn’t spare me a glance, but tightened his grip and pulled me with him.

  I was now wide awake. My skin prickled and my face grew slack with fear. Something was terribly wrong. I stumbled along and said nothing more.

  Within minutes we were at the jail. He opened the door and practically shoved me inside before letting go of my arm. The room was dim until the marshal turned up an oil lamp on the desk. The jail had not been electrified. It was a wide open room. There was another desk in the corner and four chairs. Several rifles hung in a rack behind the marshal’s desk. A door on the side of the room was closed. A wood stove in the corner added warmth, but its heat battled with cold drafts that came in from under the door and around the windows, creating warm and cold breezes about my ankles.

  I rubbed my elbow where he had gripped me and frowned to hide my fear. “I would have come peacefully,” I said.

  He only glared and snatched a paper from his desk and thrust it at me. I took it from him and found myself staring at a photograph of myself. It was the same wanted poster I’d seen in the Newport jail. I stared at it without blinking until spots formed before my eyes. My blood felt sluggish and frozen. I was going to be arrested. I was going to hang. How could I not have foreseen this? How could I not have realized that, once recognized in Newport, the game was up?

  “Not Mrs. Jones after all, are you? Nor Miss Chumley either.” He rested a hip against his desk, crossed his arms, and asked, “What’s your story, Mrs. Robert Caldwell?”

  “I—” No sound came out. I tried again. “I don’t know...I don’t know what—” A weakness came over me. The black spots before my eyes grew larger, the room swayed. Whether it was hunger and fatigue or a too tight corset or because I feared for my life, for whatever reason, I fainted dead away.

  When I regained consciousness, I was lying on a bed with a blanket over me, and I felt a tremendous relief. It was all a dream. Then I opened my eyes and saw bars on the window above me. I was in jail.

  I turned my head, which pounded as if a rubber ball bounced inside it, and saw that I wasn’t alone.

  “Drink this, Nell,” Adelaide said.

  I stared at her, puzzled. Whether it was a dream or a nightmare, Adelaide had no business being in jail with me.

  “Here, I’ll help you.” She put a hand behind my head and helped me sip from the cup. It was a nasty medicine, but it cleared my head. I realized I was not dreaming and that Adelaide was, indeed, sitting in the jail cell beside me.

  I sat up. “What are you doing here?”

  “Careful there.” Adelaide grabbed the collar of my shirtwaist which was about to fall off. It had been loosened, as had my corset. “Let me help you.” She helped me button up without tightening the corset. The clothing fit oddly, but I could breathe freely.

  Marshal Mitchell appeared in the doorway between the jail cells and his office. “She awake?”

  “Yes,” Adelaide said. “She’ll be ready in a minute.”

  “Good. Bring her out. I have some questions for her.”

  “Can you stand?” Adelaide asked, offering me her arm.

  “Yes. Why are you here?”

  “The marshal came to get me. He’s not used to ladies fainting in his office. I’m glad he did,” she said quietly. “Are you in trouble, Nell? Can I help?”

  I gave a shaky laugh. “I’m in trouble all right, but I don’t think there’s anything you can do for me.”

  I held her arm and we walked to the door. There were two cells in the room. As we walked past the second one, I noticed a man sleeping on the bunk, undisturbed by our presence.

  “Sit down, Mrs. Jones,” Marshal Mitchell said. “If you are able, I still have some questions for you. Thank you for coming, Dr. Keating. You know where to send the bill.”

  “No, don’t make her go. I want you to stay, Adelaide. Can’t she stay?” I gripped her hand. It might be my last opportunity to touch her.

  “I don’t care if she stays,” the marshal said, “but she’ll hear it all. Is that what you want?”

  “Yes.” I was resigned to that fate. “She’ll know it all soon enough.”

  We sat in the two chairs facing the marshal’s desk. He stood in front of it, leaning against it and looming above us.

  “All right then, let’s start with this.” He snatched a paper from his desk and thrust it at her. “What do you think of that, Dr. Keating?”

  I glanced at it. It was my wanted poster. Adelaide read it quickly, and I watched as her expressions changed from bewilderment to understanding to sadness and finally, when she looked up at me, fear.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  She just shook her head as if she couldn’t believe it.

  “So, Mrs. Caldwell.”

  I grimaced at the name.

  “Tell me, first, about Talbot Stanfield, if you please. The truth this time.”

  So I told him. I no longer had anything to hide. Well, hardly anything. I left out the bit about running into Mr. Stanfield again at Hennessey’s Confectionary. There was no need for two Hillyard women to hang, after all. Adelaide listened in silence.

  “He was a kind man, Marshal,” I said at the end of my story. “His wife and daughters have lost a dear husband and father.”

  He had listened with his jaw on his fist, but at my words he dropped his fist on his desk. “We’re no further along then. I’d hoped—well, no matter. You haven’t helped at all, but I’ll find out who killed him. I’ve sent wires to St. Paul. There may be a connection there.”

  He rose and poured three cups of coffee from the pot on the stove. Adelaide took one, but I didn’t want to let go of Adelaide’s hand. He set the cup on the desk where I could reach it if I chose and said, “Now, Mrs. Caldwell, it’s time to tell me your story.”

  “How I shot Robert, you mean.” I felt Adelaide’s fingers tighten on mine. “I married him four years ago. I didn’t know him well, but he was well thought of in our church. He was a deacon, and a successful businessman. He had a large house and servants. I envied the servants. Robert wasn’t kind to them, but at least they got time off, which was more than I got. The first time he beat me was our wedding night. After that...” I shook my head. “Oh, none of that matters, really. He beat me. You both know that.”

  “Why didn’t you get a divorce?” Adelaide asked.

  “I wanted to, but the only ground for divorce in New York is adultery. Robert would never commit adultery. He was too good for that. I thought about just running away. That’s what I should have done, just run away and changed my name. It’s what I did in the end anyway. But I decided that first I should try for a real divorce. Even though I couldn’t divorce him, I thought maybe I could get him to divorce me, if he thought I was the one who was unfaithful. So I wrote some letters and left them where I knew Robert would find them. They implied that I had taken a lover.”

  “Oh no,” Adelaide murmured.


  I nodded. “I knew he would be angry. I knew he would hit me. I was prepared for that, but I thought it would be worth it because it would be the last time. I could endure a beating if I got a divorce out of it. But he was more than angry. I’d never seen him like that. It was as if he’d gone mad. I’d been frightened of him before, but this was different. I thought he was going to kill me. I still think it. I’ve thought of it over and over again, and I still think it. He was going to kill me that night.” I cleared my throat. The next part would not be easy.

  “Go on,” Marshal Mitchell said.

  “Robert kept a small gun in the pocket of his coat. He had hold of my arm, but I managed to twist away. I got away from him and I got the gun. He reached for it and I shot him.” I’d never said it out loud before. The enormity of what I’d done hit me, and I said it again, “I shot him.” Tears spurted from my eyes. “I’m sorry. I’m so very sorry. It was wrong, and I shouldn’t have done it. I wish I never did. I’m sorry I killed him.”

  “You didn’t kill him,” the marshal said.

  “Yes, I did. I shot him.”

  “No, you didn’t kill him.” He took the poster from his desk and handed it to me.

  “Yes, that’s me.”

  “Look at it again.”

  I looked. It certainly was me. The photograph was taken shortly after our marriage. My hair was elaborately styled, and I wore the magnificent gown Robert had insisted upon, as well as his mother’s diamond and amber necklace, which I’d never seen again. I did not admire the likeness, but there was no doubt it was me.

  “Read it, Nell,” Adelaide said.

  Seeing my face on the wanted poster was a bit jarring, I suppose, which may have been why, though I’d seen the poster

  twice now, I had never actually read what it said. I did so now.

  $500 Reward

  MRS. ELEANOR CALDWELL

  WANTED BY THE STATE OF NEW YORK FOR

  ATTEMPTED MURDER AND ROBBERY

  Reward of $500 will be paid by Robert Caldwell for the recovery or information leading to the recovery of Mrs. Eleanor Caldwell, who disappeared from New York City on February 17, 1902, after shooting her husband, robbing him of $3200, and abandoning him to bleed nearly to death on the floor of their home. Mrs. Caldwell is 5 feet 1 inches in height, 110 pounds, blonde hair, gray eyes. Contact authorities with information or write to ROBERT CALDWELL, BOX 1757, NEW YORK, NY.

  I felt the blood drain from my face. Only moments before I wished that I’d never killed Robert. As if in answer to a prayer, that wish was granted. I ought to have been grateful, but I was not. Instead, more than anything else, I felt paralyzing fear.

  Robert was alive. “You see?” Marshal Mitchell said. “You didn’t kill him, Mrs. Caldwell. He survived.”

  “No. No, he can’t be alive. He can’t be!” I leaped to my feet and crossed my arms at my breast. “Oh, what should I do? What can I do?”

  “Nell, stop!” Adelaide jumped up and grabbed me by the shoulders. “It’s all right. He can’t hurt you here. You don’t have to be afraid anymore. He doesn’t know where you are. Nobody in this town even knows who you are except for me and the marshal here, and we’re not going to tell. Right marshal?”

  I clutched Adelaide’s arm, and we both turned to look at the marshal.

  He stared at her, met my eyes briefly, and snatched the crumpled paper from my clenched fingers. He moved to his desk and opened a thick book much like the one the lawmen in Newport had looked at. Marshal Mitchell’s was not so neatly kept. Instead of punching holes in the sides of the papers and filing them on the metal rods, the posters were simply shoved between the covers of the book, many of them still folded from their journeys through the mail. He lifted a handful off the top and shoved my poster down beneath them. He let the cover drop and said, “I’m not in the habit of arresting runaway wives.”

  Adelaide let out a heavy breath, wrapped her arm over my shoulders, and squeezed. “See?” she said, though her voice shook. “I told you it would be all right.”

  I looked from her grinning face to the marshal’s cool smile to the thick messy book of wanted posters, and the knot in my chest loosened. Was it possible that Adelaide was right? Would he truly let me go free?

  I gave a shaky laugh. “I’m not surprised you never found the poster about me before now, if that’s how you file those things.”

  “It’s organized,” he said, “sort of. I place the newest on top, so the old notices are at the bottom. And I hang the important ones.” He nodded at the wanted posters on the wall. “This book is just for petty criminals and runaway wives.”

  “So she’s free to go now?” Adelaide asked.

  “She’s not under arrest. But I wish you’d hold up a minute, Doc. I’d like you to take a look at my other prisoner. He’s been out all night and didn’t even wake up when I took Mrs. Jones in there.”

  “Certainly.” Adelaide turned to. “Will you be all right, Nell? Do you want to come with us?”

  “No, I’ll just sit here,” I said.

  They went into the jail. As soon as the door closed behind them, I got up and went to the marshal’s desk and the book of wanted posters. I’d noted where the marshal had stuffed my poster. I opened to the exact spot, pulled it out, and shoved it into my purse. I could hear them conversing with the man in the cell, so I flipped farther back in the book. The posters were in rough chronological order, as the marshal had said. The oldest were from five years ago. I flipped forward and thumbed quickly. I found what I was looking for within minutes.

  $100 REWARD FOR RUNAWAY WIFE!

  HESTER BLODGETT, twenty-six years old, five feet six inches, 140 pounds, brown hair, brown eyes. Ran away October 12, 1898. Took two little girls with her, Carrie and Jenny Blodgett, ages 8 and 6. Warren Blodgett, loving husband and father, desperately seeks information regarding their whereabouts. Reward will be paid for any information that leads to their recovery. Contact WARREN BLODGETT, St. Paul, Minnesota.

  I removed the poster and slipped it into my bag as well.

  When the jail door opened again, I sat demurely, with my hands folded over my purse and my eyes closed with fatigue.

  “If you promise to vote for women’s suffrage, I’ll guarantee you a vote for a new jail,” Adelaide was saying. “This place is falling down around your ears.”

  “I’ll take that bargain,” Marshal Mitchell said. “I’ve only got one cell that’s any good. The other one’s only fit for drunks and idiots. Anyone with half a brain could break out of it in ten minutes.”

  I felt Adelaide’s hand on my shoulder. “Wake up, Nell. I’m going to take you home now.”

  ADELAIDE HAD RIDDEN her bicycle to the jail. “It’ll take me just as long to go back for Uncle’s buggy as it will to walk you home from here,” she said. “Are you up for it?”

  I nodded. There was nothing wrong with me, after all, though I felt as if I’d survived a battle. She pushed her bicycle, and we walked side by side.

  “What happened to you to bring you to the marshal’s office?” she asked. “You always look charming, of course, but right now you look a bit as if you slept in a barn.”

  “I did, actually,” I said. There was no point in denying it. My skirt was soiled, mud caked my new boots, my hat was gone, and my hair hung loose and tangled down my back. So I told her my overnight adventure.

  “Holy smoke,” she said when I’d finished. “You’ve had a pretty rough time, haven’t you? No wonder you keeled over in the marshal’s office.”

  “I thought my corset was to blame.”

  “Well, it was, of course, but the night you had couldn’t have helped. If you ever find yourself in a pinch like that again, please let me know. You can reach me by telephone at my uncle’s. The operators put calls through to us any time of the day or night. Even if the operators from Newport have to call. Will you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good.”

  We walked in silence for a moment. I was so tired, I close
d my eyes and walked blind.

  “I wish you would have told me,” Adelaide said. Her voice was more solemn than before.

  I opened my eyes. I didn’t pretend not to know what she meant. “How could I? I thought I was a murderer. When was I supposed to tell you that?”

  “At any time,” she said. “You would have been safe with me. You’ve always been safe with me. Didn’t you know that?”

  I thought about it and realized that she was right. From the moment I first met her in the Dunns’ parlor, I’d felt safe with her. Whether she was dressing in men’s clothing or drilling holes in my cast or catching me in an elaborate lie, even when she almost kissed me, I’d felt safe.

  “I know it,” I said.

  She stopped her bike, wrapped an arm around me, and pulled me to her. She dropped her chin to my hair. I let my face rest against her neck, closed my eyes, and made no move to pull away. The thudding of her heart was loud and it reverberated through me. She held me a long time, and I drew strength and comfort from the feel and the smell and the sound of her. When she finally raised her head and let me go, I felt almost healed from the trials of the last twenty-four hours.

  We smiled at each other and continued walking.

  By the time we reached the boarding house, everyone had already left for church except for Grace and Trissie, who were just leaving.

  “Well, well, well,” Grace said. “See who’s finally come dragging in, Trissie? Was that Adelaide bringing you home? Sly Miss Chumley-Jones.”

  “Hush, Grace,” Trissie said.

  “We were surprised not to see you at Adelaide’s on Friday,” Grace said. “Guess you went over last night instead, eh? All by yourself?” She winked.