Shadows on the Ivy

by Lea Wait

  “I was just wondering. It said in the paper she was a single parent. The wife said I should find out. If she’s really that sick and all, then maybe she needs us to take care of her baby.”

  Aura wasn’t a baby. Maybe this man didn’t know any more than the paper had printed.

  “I believe arrangements have been made to take care of her child.”

  “Couldn’t be with relatives, though, could it? The wife and I are the closest thing Sarah Anderson ever had to real relatives.” He stood up and stretched. “I don’t see no one at the nurses’ station now. I think I’ll just go in and say hello to my little girl.” He looked down at Maggie. “No one’s going to tell me I can’t see my Sarah, are they?”

  “She’s very ill,” Maggie said firmly as she rose. “She can’t have visitors.”

  “So? I wouldn’t hurt her. I just want to see her. Make sure she’s the same Sarah Anderson as used to live with us in Princeton.”

  “Princeton? I don’t think Sarah ever mentioned Princeton. I thought she said she was from Pennsylvania.”

  “Oh? You sure?” The man looked at her. “Well, she might not have said.” He looked down the hall, then at Maggie again, and hesitated. “I guess I’ll wait for that doctor. He’s supposed to be here soon.” He sat down again, heavily.

  Maggie glanced at the clock on the waiting room wall. It was after nine-thirty. She had to get to campus; her class started at ten. But should she leave this man alone?

  The nurse appeared in the doorway. “Professor Summer? I have a call for you at my desk.”

  The man looked at her. “You get calls at the hospital?”

  Maggie shrugged. But who could it be? She followed the nurse, who handed her a telephone.

  Maggie just heard a dial tone. The nurse talked quickly. “You don’t have a call. I got worried after what you said, so I paged Dr. Stevens, and he told me to call the police. They’re sending someone over to talk to that man now. And they’re going to post a guard outside Sarah’s room. I wanted you to know.”

  “Thank you,” Maggie said. “He says he was Sarah’s foster father, but I know she didn’t want to see anyone she lived with in foster care. I don’t know if he would physically hurt her, but she shouldn’t be told he’s here.”

  “Got it!” whispered the nurse. “You can trust us here at the hospital. We’ll keep her safe.”

  “Good. And Mrs. Whitcomb will probably come in later. I think it would be best if she didn’t know about this man’s interest in Sarah.” Dorothy didn’t need to know that someone was claiming to be Sarah’s father.

  And the man could be dangerous. What if he was Aura’s father and didn’t want his wife, or the Division of Youth and Family Services, to know he’d sexually molested Sarah? On the other hand—what if he wanted custody of Aura? Maggie shuddered.

  As she turned toward the waiting room, she saw a policeman heading their way.

  Chapter 25

  A Tobacco Mart in Lynchburg, Virginia. Wood engraving from sketches by F. H. Taylor, published in Harper’s Weekly, May 3, 1879. Six scenes in Virginia showing black and white men and women working together, from “Auction of Leaf Tobacco” to an assembly line, “Twisting Plug Tobacco” to “Tobacco Wagons and Market” to “Pressing Bales of Smoking Tobacco.” 11 x 15.5-inch page, including header. Price: $65.

  By the time Maggie got to the campus there was only time for a quick stop at the soda machine before her class began. Luckily she’d taken her lecture notes with her when she’d left campus last night, and her portfolio of Black Americana prints was in her van. The prints were going to Morristown with her Friday.

  There’s never enough time, she thought as she took off her coat and arranged her materials on the table in front of the classroom. Gussie and Jim are arriving tomorrow night, I have no decent food in the house, and I never even turned on my computer this morning to see if Will e-mailed me late last night or this morning. She looked down at his ring. What would she say in her next note? She didn’t want him to worry about her. But all she could think about was who could be poisoning young women at the college.

  She also needed to return calls to that show promoter who wanted her to do Allentown, and to the woman who wanted to sell Godey’s fashion prints. Maybe after class she could find a free half hour to catch up with her life.

  Once each semester she and Linc James, who taught ethnic studies, exchanged a day’s classes and perspectives. He was going to teach her “Myths in American Culture” course Friday morning, concentrating on the contributions of racial minorities to America’s perspectives about itself and its peoples. And, coincidentally, giving her a little more time to prepare for the Morristown show. Today it was her turn to take his “African-American History and Culture” class.

  Clearly news of Tiffany’s death had already spread. She heard “Tiffany” and “Whitcomb House” and then “Sarah” whispered within clusters of students around the classroom. By this afternoon the news would have hit the media, and no doubt television, radio, and newspaper reporters would be interviewing students in the quadrangle. Publicity. But not the sort Max would value.

  Where was Max? And Dorothy and Oliver Whitcomb? Dorothy hadn’t been at the hospital. Although with Sarah’s foster father waiting to see her, it was probably just as well if Dorothy had other commitments this morning.

  The students broke off their conversations and filled in the seats as Maggie introduced herself. “I’m Professor Summer from the American Studies department, and I’m also an antique-print dealer. Professor James and I are exchanging our class periods this week. This morning I’m going to share some visual perspectives of African-Americans in nineteenth-century America. The prints I’m going to show you are from my business or are reproductions of prints I wish were from my business!”

  There were a few smiles in the classroom. Maggie was glad this would be one of her show-and-tell lectures; the students were distracted by the events on campus, and visuals might keep them focused on what she had to say and not on what had happened during the last two days. And today’s subject was an interesting one—at least to her. Her task was to share that excitement with students who probably had little background in either nineteenth-century art or nineteenth-century popular culture.

  “Relatively few engravings of any kind done in America until the middle of the nineteenth century included black Americans, slave or free. But that in itself is not a commentary on America’s view of African-Americans. Until the middle of the nineteenth century, when lithography made printmaking easier and more accessible, there were very few prints made of any Americans unless they were famous. And, not surprisingly, those who were famous were, for the most part, white men. Newspapers rarely contained illustrations. Book illustrations were either wood engravings in children’s primers, steel engravings of scenic views, or hand-colored engravings in natural-history books. And many of those, despite being of American subjects, were actually printed in Europe, usually by publishers in London or Edinburgh.

  “However, by the 1850s Nathaniel Currier and his partner and brother-in-law, James Ives, had declared their intention to become ‘printmakers to the American people,’ and Harper’s Weekly in New York and Ballou’s Pictorial in Boston, among other newspapers that featured wood engravings, were bringing illustrations of current events to their readers. Both Currier and Ives prints and those in the periodicals included pictures of black Americans.

  “Some of the pictures we’re going to look at are what we today consider racist. During the mid-nineteenth century stereotypical views of racial or ethnic groups were common, especially when the subjects were black Americans, Irish Americans, or, a little later in the century, Chinese Americans.”

  A student in the first row raised her hand. “Did publications in the American South reflect the same views of black Americans as the ones you mentioned that were in the Northeast?”

  “Good question. Southern periodicals tended to ignore black Americans rather than depict them nega
tively. And newspapers in the South such as The Charleston Mercury were, for an assortment of reasons, not distributed as widely as, say, Harper’s Weekly. Their influence was therefore more limited.” Maggie paused. “Since we’re talking about geographic differences, the Illustrated London News was one of the few publications anywhere that included illustrations of slave ships and slave sales in America.

  “The first Currier and Ives prints of blacks, pre–Civil War, showed them as realistic, individual people, but usually as background figures in both city and country scenes. For example, several lithographs of George Washington show Washington speaking with or being attended by his slaves. As the abolitionist movement grew in popularity, some depictions of blacks illustrated the horrors of slavery. In this 1845 print, Branding Slaves on the Coast of Africa Previous to Embarkation, Currier shows a white sailor who is smoking a pipe, and, at the same time, casually branding the back of a chained black man. It’s the strongest antislavery print Currier ever published.

  “On the other hand, during and after the Civil War, Currier and Ives went back to largely picturing blacks in dependent, stereotypical roles.

  “Currier and Ives were trying to appeal to the largest possible audience. At that time opinions on the status and possible future of blacks in America varied greatly. Some Northerners blamed slaves for the Civil War. The intelligence level of black Americans was still being debated. Ironically, after the Civil War, racist jokes became more popular.

  “Reflecting that popularity, between the mid-1870s and the 1890s racism clearly appeared in two different series: the Dark-town series of cartoons drawn by Thomas Worth, 1834 to 1917, and published by Currier and Ives, and the Blackville series of wood engravings by Sol Eytinge, which appeared in Harper’s Weekly. In both of these series black Americans are depicted in overtly racist ways. They’re doing everyday things—celebrating holidays, racing horses, having picnics, getting married—but they’re drawn with stereotypical looks and are shown behaving and dressing in ways that emphasize their ineptitude. For example, blacks in this series were illustrated dressed in formal hunting attire, but riding donkeys backward and falling off, in imitation of formal British hunting scenes featuring whites. Some critics say these pictures are parodies of hunting prints of the period, that they’re designed to make fun of the habits of upper-class whites. But, whatever their intent, they clearly imply that blacks could not compete in such ‘white’ pastimes.

  “But in the same postwar period, to appeal to those who valued black contributions to American life, Currier and Ives and Harper’s Weekly both published lithographs and wood engravings that showed black Americans engaged in real, respected activities. The Gallant Charge of the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts (Colored) Regiment, issued in 1863, was reissued by Currier and Ives in 1888 on the twenty-fifth anniversary of that regiment’s famous attack on the rebel stronghold on Morris Island, near Charleston. The lithograph was clearly designed to show the valued role black soldiers played in the Civil War. And as part of its series of portraits of beautiful women, Currier and Ives included The Young African and The Colored Beauty.

  “A number of Harper’s Weekly illustrations by such artists as Winslow Homer and S. G. McCutcheon also showed black Americans as ‘real people,’ not stereotypes, as did the work of William Ludwell Sheppard, an officer in the Army of the Confederacy who illustrated the Southern side of the Civil War.

  “Here is one of my personal favorites.” Maggie picked up a print from the desk. “A Lesson in History—Decoration Day, 1881, by McCutcheon. A schoolhouse is in the background, and in the foreground an old black man is sitting on a stone wall outside a cemetery, pointing at a grave decorated by a laurel wreath and an American flag, telling three black children carrying slates and books about the black contribution to the Civil War.

  “In short, during the second half of the nineteenth century we can find examples in popular art of a variety of views of the black experience. And since in the same publications we can find both views that today we see as racist and views that are respectful and complimentary, it appears the editors were trying to market to audiences with a variety of thoughts and opinions. I will add that Thomas Nast, the great political cartoonist of the late nineteenth century, who lived here in New Jersey, was an abolitionist who believed in the worth of black Americans, and he frequently depicted their detractors in unflattering poses in his cartoons.”

  Maggie went on, covering other artists, and other series. As often happened when she talked about prints, she could sense some of the students catching her excitement. Many of them had never seen actual nineteenth-century views of black Americans.

  “You said the prints you’ve been showing us are from your business,” said a bearded young man who stopped to speak with Maggie after class. “Is it easy to find prints like that?”

  “Challenging, but not impossible,” said Maggie. “Paper printed over one hundred years ago has to have been well cared for to have lasted until now. But there are people who collect old newspapers or prints. You can find the prints at antique shows, where dealers like me exhibit, or at ‘paper shows,’ which are showcases for dealers in all sorts of paper ephemera, from newspapers and magazines to advertisements to postcards to books.”

  “I’d really like my father to see some of your prints,” the student said.

  “I’ll be doing an antique show in Morristown this weekend.” She handed him two discount admission cards to the show. “Give these to your father, and if he’s able to come, be sure to tell him to introduce himself to me.”

  Maggie packed up her prints and notes and headed for her office. Today’s lecture had gone well, despite the thoughts of Sarah and Tiffany that kept filling her mind. She loved her prints and loved introducing students to them. Her lectures were a success if students at least became aware of nineteenth-century American prints as a way to see the nineteenth century as it had seen itself. Shadows of the past…

  But this week her world was full of other kinds of shadows. Had there been any sort of confrontation between the police and Sarah’s foster father at the hospital? Did they have any suspects in Tiffany’s murder? Had Maria kept her promise and told the police her suspicion that Tiffany had been trying to blackmail someone?

  Someone had to pay for what had happened. Someone would pay. And she would do all she could to make that happen.

  Chapter 26

  The Praying Mantis. Tipped-in lithograph illustrating Fabre’s Book of Insects, illustrated by E. J. Detmold, 1921, New York. The delicately colored mantid, or mantis, holds out its front legs gracefully in an upraised position suggestive of prayer while it is lying in wait for its prey. For that reason the Greeks named it mantis, or “prophet.” Often the female devours the male after mating. 5.75 x 6.75 inches. Price: $75.

  Maggie picked up the pile of pink slips waiting for her on Claudia’s desk. Uncle Sam was curled up on Claudia’s chair; Claudia must be having lunch. Sam looked up at Maggie, yawned widely, and put his head down again. Clearly he was the only one on campus not concerned about Sarah, Tiffany, or his own safety. And Claudia hadn’t unlocked Maggie’s office this morning, so he hadn’t been playing bravest cat in the jungle with her snake plant. One positive point for today.

  Linc had planned to take the day off since Maggie was handling his class, so his door was closed, too. She heard voices inside Paul’s office. Probably he was with a student. Good. She needed some quiet time to get caught up. And she didn’t want to think about last night.

  Maggie searched the depths of her pocketbook for her keys. She always dropped them on top. How did they manage to maneuver their way to the bottom and camouflage themselves, hiding themselves next to the loose change, pens, tissues, single aspirin, business cards, magnifying glass, credit cards, and…there they were. Maggie unlocked her office door.

  She put the portfolio on the visitor’s chair and turned to sit at the desk. Then she turned back. Something was different. She saw it at once: Tiffany’s briefcase was
on the floor next to the visitor’s chair. She must have left it there yesterday afternoon.

  Could Tiffany have been trying to blackmail someone? If so, since there was no trace of photographs in her room at Whitcomb House, then she might have had them with her. Maggie took a deep breath, picked up the briefcase, and tried to open it. Locked. Of course. If Tiffany was carrying something valuable, then she would have locked it.

  Should she call the police? They’d be able to break the lock. Or pick it.

  But maybe Maria was mistaken about the blackmail. Tiffany was dead, but she still deserved some privacy. But her killer didn’t deserve any protection. Maggie sat at her desk and held the smooth leather Coach briefcase on her lap. With its rich, soft leather and burnished hardware, it was not the sort of accessory a typical supermarket cashier would have.

  Kendall had said one of Tiffany’s gentleman friends had given it to her. Maybe the man she was supposedly blackmailing?

  That would be ironic, Maggie thought. To carry materials that could destroy someone in the briefcase he had given you.

  Paul’s words last night came back to her: “Oliver is interested in the young women of Whitcomb House.” Could he have been the person she was going to blackmail?

  Maggie unlocked the large file drawer on the right side of her desk where she kept records of student grades. She slipped the briefcase inside and relocked the drawer. She needed to think.

  Oliver certainly had money. Enough money to be worth blackmailing. He was married. Tiffany had implied to Maria that the man she was seeing was married. But the bruises…Could Oliver have been abusive? Maggie shook her head in confusion. Oliver was a big man, but he had always seemed so gentle. Maybe not in business. But Dorothy certainly didn’t seem afraid of him. And people who were abusive were consistently abusive, weren’t they? Oliver didn’t look or act like a brute. Yet…there had been opportunity. He had met the women of Whitcomb House often enough. And Oliver wouldn’t have wanted Dorothy to know if he was having an affair.