‘‘A trifle,’’ I repeated, keeping the despair from my voice. After all, Johanna was possibly guiltless— though I remembered her slipping her arm through mine as we walked toward the Grand Opera. ‘‘I suppose the clasp broke and I dropped it along the way. Just a bracelet with a dozen paste jewels.’’
Well—seven paste jewels. The other five had been my little niece’s future.
Next morning, as soon as Johanna left our chamber to assist her mother, I did a thorough but fruitless search of her vanity table and clothing—although I couldn’t truly believe that Johanna had it. For all her skill as a juggler, she didn’t seem clever enough to remove a bracelet from under the sleeve of a young lady as alert and knowledgeable as I. I donned a simple walking dress and went in to a hearty breakfast. Afterward I thanked her mother, told Johanna I would see her at the theatre, and set off to retrace my steps.
I did not have high hopes of finding my bracelet. Johanna had not been the only one who had been near me the night before. The porter, Peebles, had bumped my arm as he lifted my trunk into his barrow and numerous people had brushed by on the crowded streets. As I walked I tried to remember the details of our journey the night before. Here was a corner where I’d paused to look back at Peebles and my trunk; here Johanna had met a German relative of her mother’s on the street; here was Mabel Loewenstein’s home. I paused; could I have dropped it on that Turkey carpet? It was too early to call on her, but later I would.
I continued down the street and across the drawbridge. If the hasp had broken there the bracelet might have fallen through the steel grid into the busy Chicago River below, which teemed with scows and shouting rivermen. But when I reached Clark Street and remembered the jostling throngs outside the Grand Opera, I had to admit that even a young lady as clever as I might have missed a master pickpocket if distracted, and hang it, I had been distracted. I’d been conversing with Johanna, and watching for gentlemen with hunting watches, and making certain that Peebles, in his yellow checked cap, was following with my trunk.
Peebles, who had nudged my arm. He could so easily have taken my bracelet.
It was time to hunt for Peebles.
It was not easy.
Though I watched for him every day, Peebles did not appear near the theatre where I had first found him, nor around the train stations. Johanna was no help, being all atwitter about her upcoming Monday walk in the park with the peerless Officer Degan. Toward the end of the week Kohl and Middleton asked us all, even the slobbering hero dogs, to play for a week at their second theatre, a mile west on Madison, and Sunday was spent moving and rehearsing in the new space.
On Monday I wished Johanna a happy day with Officer Degan and returned to question the porters at the railroad station. At last I found a spiky-haired fellow who knew Peebles. ‘‘He’s not really one of us, mum, he’s a machinist. Worked for McCormick Reaper, see, but got locked out back in February along with the other union men,’’ he explained. ‘‘To put bread on the table he works as a porter when he can get the use of a barrow.’’
‘‘Do you know where he lives?’’
My informant shrugged. ‘‘Moves from one relative to another. If you want to find him, try looking at the McCormick works.’’
‘‘But you said he’d been locked out.’’
‘‘A lot of the union men picket outside the gates and holler at the scabs.’’
When he’d given me directions to McCormick’s, out Blue Island Avenue, I rewarded the unkempt fellow with a few pennies, then took the streetcar, as the McCormick works were some three miles from the city center.
I did not ride the full distance, because when we reached Twenty-second Street I saw a large crowd of workers, Peebles perhaps among them. The workers were gathered around a boxcar, and atop it stood a man perhaps thirty years old, with a handsome light brown mustache and a gaze that might have inspired Shakespeare to cry, ‘‘Look on me with your welkin eye!’’ He was speaking in German when I first approached, and about half of the large crowd was nodding, but he soon shifted to pleasantly accented English. As I wandered through the crowd searching for Peebles, I couldn’t help but hear some of what the handsome gentleman was saying. ‘‘Wherever we cast our eyes,’’ he declared with a sweeping gesture, ‘‘we see that a few men have not only brought technical inventions into their private ownership, but have also confiscated for their exclusive advantage all natural powers, such as water, steam and electricity. They little care that they destroy their fellow beings right and left.’’ The blue eyes blazed and indignation radiated from his honest face.
‘‘Who is the speaker?’’ I murmured to a grizzled man who was nodding enthusiastically.
He looked at me with pity. ‘‘You don’t know? He is the editor of the best German newspaper, the Arbeiter-Zeitung, and one of our most popular speakers. His name is August Shpeece.’’ Later I learned that, in the peculiar way the Germans have, it was spelled Spies, but I always thought of him as August.
‘‘We must progress to cooperative labor for the purpose of continuing life and of enjoying it,’’ August told us. ‘‘Anarchy does not mean bloodshed, does not mean arson or robbery. These monstrosities are, on the contrary, the characteristic features of capitalism.’’
Well, having recently been robbed, I certainly agreed that it was a monstrosity, and I was ready to do away with whatever had caused it, though I wasn’t certain what this dreadful thing ‘‘capitalism’’ was. And August had mentioned anarchy favorably—but surely he couldn’t be one of the horrid anarchists that the newspapers told us we must fear! I couldn’t believe it of such a kindly, well-spoken man.
‘‘Do not be slaves! Your toil produces the wealth, it is yours, not the bosses’!’’ August cried. ‘‘Workers must stand firmly together, then we will prevail!’’
Oh, they were splendid words, as stirring as Shakespeare’s ‘‘Once more unto the breach’’! I was on the verge of running up to Kohl and Middleton and pummeling them for higher wages! But on reflection I wasn’t certain that the other workers would stand firmly with me, as August advised. Johanna might, and perhaps her brother if he wasn’t at the beer hall. But those giant hero dogs were more likely to rescue the managers than attack them. I decided I’d best wait for better troops.
There was no sign of Peebles, and I could see another clump of men farther along Blue Island Avenue near the McCormick works. So I left August and his enormous crowd behind me, and moved on toward the pickets outside McCormick’s. Suddenly a loud bell clanged. A man called, ‘‘Here they come!’’ and as workers began to emerge from the door the men who’d been locked out began to holler ‘‘Scabs!’’ and ‘‘Shame!’’ and some German words that sounded even worse. I thought I saw a yellow checked cap on the far side of the little crowd and started toward it eagerly. But a few among the picketers picked up stones and threw them at the strikebreakers, and suddenly there was a melee. One of the two policemen on duty fought his way to a patrol box to call for help.
Well, my aunt Mollie always said that a lady should never get involved in anything as low-class as a riot, so notwithstanding August’s inspiring words I ducked around the corner of a building, and a lucky thing I did! When I peeked I saw a patrol wagon full of policemen, drawn by two galloping horses, careening up Blue Island Avenue and straight into the crowd. ‘‘It’s Black Jack Bonfield!’’ cried a picket, and a few stones were thrown at the police. The officers laid about with their nightsticks and bloodied many heads, and soon were joined by dozens of officers on foot. The strikebreakers had run back into the building but a few picketers continued to throw stones. Although the police had the upper hand, whenever I glimpsed a face under a helmet it looked frightened. Captain Bonfield, a squinty-eyed fellow, yelled something I couldn’t hear above the shouting, and the officers pulled their revolvers.
Well, in my experience revolvers make a situation a sight more dangerous than stones and nightsticks. I dove back to safety and pulled my Colt from my bustle pocket. I hea
rd gunshots and screams and in a moment the pickets were dragging their wounded friends away, some to the haven where I stood. The groans of the bleeding men were piteous indeed.
At last the gunshots stopped, and I peeked again, but could not see Peebles. I heard a familiar voice and saw August come running toward the factory, looking as shocked and sickened as I felt.
The picketers had scattered, and the police arrested the stragglers while shouting congratulations to each other for winning such a glorious victory. Yes indeed.
When they’d left I put away my Colt and tore strips from my petticoat to hand to those who had crept out to help the wounded. Peebles was not among them. My chance to find him was gone, and even the handsome blue-eyed August had left. Frustrated, I kicked a stone into the street and made my way back to Kohl and Middleton’s.
At the theatre I found Johanna too in a dark mood. She wore a terrible scowl, and was distracted and clumsier than usual, dropping a ball once and almost lighting her poor brother’s hair on fire with a poorly aimed torch. Afterward he drew me aside. ‘‘Please, Bridget, walk home with her! The only thing she said to me was, ‘You men are beasts!’ ’’
Well, I had to agree with her opinion of men after seeing all the pelting and shooting at McCormick’s. I followed her out the door and murmured, ‘‘Johanna, what did that dreadful Officer Degan do?’’
‘‘Nothing!’’ She strode up Halsted Street and I had to trot to keep up.
‘‘Nothing? You mean some other horrid man has hurt you?’’
‘‘No! I mean he did nothing! He didn’t meet me in the park!’’ She began to weep.
I offered her a handkerchief, patted her arm, and asked, ‘‘Didn’t Detective Loewenstein say that Officer Degan worked with Captain Bonfield’s men? They were in action today, so perhaps Matt couldn’t—’’
‘‘But he promised!’’ Johanna sobbed.
I suggested, ‘‘Why don’t we go speak to your friend Mabel? She can tell you if Officer Degan had adequate reason for such a terrible breach of courtesy.’’
Johanna nodded and allowed herself to be guided toward the Loewenstein home. I was pleased, for I too had questions.
‘‘I’m delighted to see you!’’ Mabel, in a violet jacket dress, hugged us both. ‘‘Jakey is so busy these days. I dined alone again tonight—’’ A shadow darkened her lively features. She looked more closely at Johanna and added, ‘‘But Johanna, what is wrong?’’
Though red-eyed from weeping, Johanna was listening carefully to Mabel’s words. She asked, ‘‘You say Jake is busy these days? Abandons you?’’
‘‘Sometimes it seems that way! Captain Schaack assigns him to these secret meetings—oh, I shouldn’t be telling you this—’’
Johanna sank into a plush armchair, sniffled into my handkerchief, and asked, ‘‘Do you think Matt Degan was assigned to a secret meeting?’’
Mabel looked surprised. ‘‘I wouldn’t think so. He’s not a detective. If he had to stay on duty to help Captain Bonfield, it wouldn’t be a secret assignment like Jake’s. Matt should have got word to you!’’
‘‘He didn’t,’’ Johanna sobbed.
‘‘Let me get you some tea,’’ Mabel soothed.
I followed her into the butler’s pantry. She frowned back at Johanna and murmured to me, ‘‘Poor Johanna! She should not bestow her heart so easily.’’
‘‘Do you mean Officer Degan is not reliable?’’
She shrugged and placed the teapot on the tray. ‘‘When I mentioned Johanna’s hopes to Jake, he laughed and said Degan had more than one young lady at his beck and call.’’
‘‘Oh dear, poor Johanna. Mabel, I had another question. I may have dropped a bracelet while I was visiting here.’’ I described it as we carried the tea back to Johanna, who had risen from her chair and was pacing about the parlor.
‘‘I will look very carefully,’’ Mabel promised with a little frown. ‘‘Sit down, Johanna, have some tea!’’
We finally convinced Johanna that Matt might yet apologize and she stopped sobbing. Mabel maintained that Jake and the others were upset because of the labor unrest, and would be kind and loving once again when the work was not so frightening. ‘‘Jakey hates to feel frightened. He much prefers being angry.’’
I couldn’t help thinking of wise old Shakespeare, who said, ‘‘To be furious is to be frighted out of fear.’’ Captain Bonfield’s order to shoot had helped his men feel fury instead of fear; but laborers were men too, and Bonfield had given them cause to be more frightened than ever, and I wondered if their fear would turn to fury too.
Instead, they called another meeting.
At breakfast Johanna was silent, probably brooding on Matt Degan, but her brother Peter was reading the Arbeiter-Zeitung and I asked if it mentioned the shots at the McCormick works. ‘‘Oh, yes!’’ he said. ‘‘They write about the injustice of the police firing on unarmed men, and say workers should carry dynamite or revolvers in self-defense. They’ve called a meeting tonight. Look, it’s at the Haymarket, very close to the theatre! Our show will be over in time to hear the last speeches.’’
‘‘This is strong language,’’ his mother cautioned, pausing teapot in hand to frown over his shoulder at the paper. ‘‘ ‘Avenge the atrocious murder that has been committed upon your brothers today’—Do be careful, Peter.’’
But like Peter, I wanted to go. Peebles might well be there with answers about my bracelet—and perhaps the handsome, fiery August as well.
It was after nine and dark when Johanna and Peter and I departed from Kohl and Middleton’s, leaving the Saint Bernards to finish the evening performance. We walked a block to Desplaines and turned north toward the meeting, where Peter met his ruddy-faced friend Archie, a reporter for the Chicago Times. ‘‘Look at all the police Captain Bonfield has mustered,’’ Archie said.
‘‘Why do they call him Black Jack?’’ I asked.
‘‘He can be brutal. Like yesterday’s shooting,’’ Archie said. ‘‘Or last year during the streetcar strike, when he clubbed everyone in reach, even store owners who came out to see what was happening. A gas company worker named Kerwin is still laid up from that beating.’’
‘‘They ought to replace Bonfield,’’ Peter said.
‘‘The mayor might, but Marshall Field and his rich friends are nervous with this talk of dynamite, and they think Bonfield can frighten the eight-hour supporters. Look, he’s lining up reinforcements.’’ Archie gestured at the alley we were passing and made a note.
Johanna said nothing but I saw her crane her neck to look for Matt Degan among the massed officers. I tugged her arm and we moved on up Desplaines.
There was a large crowd ahead, and several men including the welkin-eyed August up on a wagon. The man speaking was nearly as appealing as August, but had coal black hair and mustache. His beautiful English had a hint of a Southern accent. ‘‘It’s Albert Parsons,’’ Archie told us. ‘‘He edits the English-language anarchist paper. That’s his wife and children on the next wagon, see them?’’
Parsons was saying, ‘‘I am not here for the purpose of inciting anybody, but to speak out, to tell the facts as they exist, even though it should cost me my life.’’
I was beginning to think that the rich folks had it all wrong about the anarchists, who claimed to be filled with the noblest of sentiments: truth-telling, cooperation, and love for family. Parsons mentioned Jay Gould, who owned railroads now instead of banks, and someone shouted, ‘‘Hang him!’’
‘‘No,’’ Parsons replied, ‘‘this is not a conflict against individuals, but for a change of system. Kill Jay Gould, and like a jack-in-a-box another or a hundred others like him will come up in his place.’’
‘‘Hang him!’’ cried a boy, and the huge crowd laughed.
Archie seemed disappointed and snapped his notebookclosed. ‘‘Won’t sell any papers with that peaceful stuff.’’
But it was my bracelet that I wanted to find. I excused myself and slippe
d into the crowd to search for Peebles.
After introducing the next speaker, a bearded British fellow named Fielden, Parsons left the speakers’ wagon and joined his family nearby. I continued searching through the crowd. There was a low rumble of thunder in the north, and a gust of wind blew papers about. Parsons called to Fielden, ‘‘It’s going to rain! Do you want to finish in Zepf’s Hall?’’
Fielden said, ‘‘I’m nearly done. Then we can all go home.’’ Parsons nodded and gathered his children to take them to Zepf’s for shelter.
Many people were glancing at the sky and leaving. Fearing that I would miss Peebles, I made my way up the entry steps of a building for a better look. At last, in the glimmer of the streetlight, I saw his yellow checked cap! He was making his way toward Lake Street, not far behind Parsons’ family. I started after. It seemed now that there was a faint thunder in the south as well, but I didn’t take my eyes from him until I heard a loud voice call out, ‘‘Disperse!’’ and Peebles stopped to look back.
I looked too, and hang it, I’d never seen so many policemen! The street was inky with them, rank on rank, filling Desplaines Street from the speakers’ wagon back toward the police station. At the head of the wall of police was Captain Bonfield, facing Fielden on the speakers’ wagon. Fielden said, ‘‘But we are peaceable!’’
‘‘Disperse!’’ insisted Bonfield’s spokesman.
Fielden didn’t argue. He said, ‘‘All right, we will go,’’ and jumped down from the wagon. The others shrugged and began climbing down, even August. I was about to turn back to Peebles when I saw a bright spark like a shooting star sizzle through the air from the east edge of the street into the center of the police ranks.
And then, lordy! A fearsome thunderclap. A flash as bright as noon. A blast of wind that blew me against the wall. Around me windows cracked.
For just an instant, silence quivered in the air. I looked for Peebles and he was standing there bedazzled, like the rest of us.
Sisters On the Case Page 4