by Carrie Lofty
He glanced backward. On occasions he appeared positively aristocratic—all strong lines and finely wrought symmetry—but that had clashed with his more brutal impulses. Now his glasses lent such an academic air that Polly momentarily questioned her sanity. What would the likes of him want with a girl like her? When he had treated her more . . . roughly, she almost believed him capable of forgoing everything in order to claim her.
On that evening, after having seen his son and his more composed nature, she despaired. A craving she hadn’t realized she possessed sank through to her heels. They had no more future than was permitted by their overlapping, occasionally conflicting interests.
And in a year and a half, he would be gone.
She swallowed and tried to find a light voice. “Are you looking for something in particular?”
“My hope was to write a paper to further examine the origin of the Orionids. I haven’t had much time of late.”
Polly nodded, although her understanding and a big chunk of her confidence were tumbling away in a sloping rush. “Care to explain, Professor?”
“I’m not a professor. Just an instructor until I earn my tenure. I’d hoped my paper would make that happen.” His quirk of a smile appeared a little forlorn. “It’ll have to wait.”
“Some dreams must,” she said quietly.
They watched one another for a long moment. The cut on his brow was healing well; he’d removed the stitches. But no matter how scholarly the glasses made him appear, she did not like them. They caught the lamplight and reflected the details of the room. The eyes she so anticipated studying were almost entirely obscured.
He returned to the telescope. “The Orionids are an annual meteor shower. When Earth’s orbit takes the planet through the path of a comet, particles from that comet enter our atmosphere. As they plummet to the ground, they catch fire and streak across the sky.”
“Shooting stars.”
“Exactly.” Another adjusted dial. Another note with his nub of a pencil. “The current debate regarding the Orionids has to do with which comet. I hadn’t thought to get involved because my opportunities to observe them back home were scarce. The latitude is all wrong. But here . . .”
“Here?”
He straightened. His smile broadened, electrifying Polly down to her soles. What a different man he was when he spoke about astronomy—not so reluctant as when he discussed business, not so rough as when he didn’t get his way.
“Have a look. We’re in luck tonight.”
Polly scraped her teeth across her bottom lip, then smiled back. “Very well.”
With more nonchalance than she felt, she stepped toward the telescope. He smelled wonderful. Warm. Clean. A hint of shaving soap still lingered. The scent would be so much more satisfying if she nuzzled the crook of his neck.
He turned both lamps down to near-darkness. “They’re just for recording notes. But it’s best to let the eyes work without so much contrast.”
“Such a ready explanation, master. As if you thought I’d suspect you of less academic motives.”
He sighed, still smiling a little. “You’re teasing me again.”
“Nicely spotted. Now, what am I looking for?”
“You’ll see.”
Polly leaned over the eyepiece as she’d seen him do.
“Close your other eye,” he said.
She did—and gasped. A dozen pinpricks of light seemed near enough to touch. Then they were gone, like sparks climbing out of a bonfire. Another two took their place before fading. Then four more. Pieces of light came and went across the deepening backdrop of night. A sense of floating outside of herself overcame Polly, as if she were watching quick, silvery sprites. So hypnotized was she by their fleeting performance, she nearly forgot about Alex.
But his voice . . .
“Beautiful, aren’t they?”
So low and so close.
“Beautiful,” she echoed, not knowing what other word would do. She hadn’t his breadth of language.
She was surprisingly moved by what she witnessed. A longing lodged in her chest, much as she experienced when thinking about faraway places. A girl like her should be content with knowing such wonders existed, if she ever learned about them at all.
“They’re best seen out away from the city,” Alex said. “Factory smoke and electric lights obscure their true grandeur.”
She straightened, reluctant to leave those stars but knowing her place was on the ground. “Tell me, why did you want to show me this?”
He took off his glasses and set them next to the cup of tea, which could have been days old. His hazel eyes took on that darker, probing directness. Nearly all of the green was stolen by night shadows. His mouth, generally set toward some stern purpose, remained relaxed. A gentle smile held his lips in a soft caress. The dimmed lamplight made a thousand possibilities . . . possible.
“Lord knows what you must think of me after . . . after everything. I wanted to show you who I really am.”
Polly impulsively kissed his cheek. “I know what sort of man you are, master.”
“Please, don’t call me that again.”
The distant sound of Edmund’s cry jerked his gaze toward the door.
Too overwhelmed by that intimacy, she needed out. Edmund was the perfect excuse. “I’ll be leaving now. My family will expect me for supper. And you have your boy to attend.”
“True.” He stuffed his hands into his trouser pockets. “With Griggs having taken the carriage, I’ll hail a hackney to get you home. The hour is late.”
Although she wanted to protest, she recognized his determination and relented. “Aye. I’d like that.”
It was Monday morning, the day of Alex’s second official meeting with the mill masters. His first had been mere days after arriving in Glasgow, and he’d known nothing, held no opinions.
So much had changed since then.
He knew his mood was poor when he welcomed the distraction of Edmund’s cries. After heating a bottle, he sat in the nursery rocking chair and held his son.
His thoughts glanced toward Mamie, but perhaps not in the way a widower should regard his late wife. He should feel more guilt about how much he enjoyed Polly’s company, not to mention his undeniable sexual response to the young woman. However, Mamie had never been the sort to indulge in jealous fits. Quite the opposite. Her insistence that he take a mistress had been one of the more difficult conversations they’d navigated. Alex had refused. With consideration for his needs alone, taking a discreet mistress would’ve been the obvious solution.
He’d still held out hope that she would come around. One day.
Holding their son, with the sun angling through the eastern windows, Alex craved her level mind and keen sense of empathy. He wanted to understand Polly Gowan, which might be beyond his capacity. Mamie had been his emotional barometer. Social engagements, dinner parties, casual picnics on the beach—the trivialities of human ritual made sense when she was there to help interpret. He’d gauge her mood and her reactions, then pattern his replies accordingly. They had become friends that way, with weaknesses offset and comfort supplied.
On his own, he had no North Star to guide him.
Worse than that. He had young Edmund to raise up to manhood, without the steadying care Mamie would’ve applied. Although fragile, maybe even broken, she had been such a generous woman. Fatherhood would not seem quite the terror with her to steady their little family.
“You tell me, Edmund. What do I do?”
Seeking advice from his infant was only slightly less desperate than talking to his dead wife. He closed his eyes. Images of Polly assaulted him almost immediately. Red hair. Wide eyes. Mischievous comments. He’d tasted her ardent kisses and pulsed inside her welcoming heat, but he had yet to see her body. That was a brutal truth.
He could not indulge again, not while keeping his perspective. Why hadn’t he left well enough alone?
Dawn found him before sleep did, with Edmund dozing in his arms
. Arising, his back stiff, he settled his son into his crib. Agnes met him in the doorway, already dressed. Her salt-and-pepper hair was covered in a floral kerchief. Only two nights on from moving into Alex’s home, the woman was already a blessing.
“Good morrow, sir. Just come to check on the wee lad.”
“He was fussy during the night. Feeding him did little.”
She nodded and softly smiled. “Then I shan’t wake him now.”
He turned to go—and saw a note slid under his front door. Although he sprinted forth and faced the cool smack of a spring morning, he saw nothing of the message bearer. This was no ordinary postal delivery.
He recognized the handwriting. Josiah Todd didn’t even feel the need to disguise his threats anymore. Yet with each new letter, the scrawl was becoming more difficult to read. This was the fourth Alex had received. Always the same threats. Always the same “proof” that Edmund belonged to the Todds.
After ripping open the missive, Alex quickly scanned its contents. Dawn lit the heavy ivory paper, yet nothing could completely illuminate its meaning. Disjointed sentences were interspersed with quotes from Shakespeare and the Bible. Alex swallowed the taste of bile. If the raving words were any measure, Todd was going mad.
Time shrank around Alex in that little foyer. He’d been allotted two years to make Christie Textiles profitable—if only he kept his head and learned quickly. But the mill fire and the threats from his father-in-law chipped away at that luxury of time. His gut told him he had far fewer days.
Damn. Time. He checked a wall clock. The meeting would begin in less than an hour.
He quickly washed, dressed, and shaved. As for the letter, he tucked it in his suit coat. Perhaps he needed a potent reminder of what the meeting meant for his son’s future.
In the building that housed the offices of Christie Textiles, he strode past a line of clerks who busily attended their masters’ greatcoats. Alex climbed up to the meeting room and dropped his portfolio at the head of a large table surrounded by eight chairs. The boardroom took up most of the second story; its construction dominated by a wide bank of windows that overlooked the street below. The view was impressive, but Alex knew enough about the movement of heat to realize what a colossal waste of resources those windows entailed.
Eventually all of the seats were filled.
“Gentlemen. Good morrow to you.”
A selection of replies filtered back, from George Winchester’s spoiled Etonian elocution to Frankie McGovern’s broad Highlands brogue. The seven men represented Alex’s competition and his closest equals in Glasgow society. None had been born to status. All were self-made or the sons of self-made men.
The meeting started politely enough, although plagued by conflicting reports and agendas. Alex kept his temper. Initially. He was too busy taking notes when the odd tidbit fell from careless lips: production quotas, wages, absentee rates. He was still a newcomer to the industry, and conflicting courses of action demanded data. After sorting through the figures, he would make his decisions. Later.
As the hours progressed, however, the resonance of the conversation slid toward hostility. Even belligerence. Insults against the union. Disdain for lazy, corrupt constables. And the beginnings of an agreement to lower wages.
Alex’s skin prickled. Yes, he had worked with Mamie for social justice. And yes, he was honoring Polly’s entreaty to listen on behalf of the union. But those concerns conflicted with one stark fact: the son he’d held that morning was not safe. He touched the place where Josiah Todd’s letter burned like a reminder of hell.
His mill would earn a profit. It was well behind in fulfilling orders because of the sabotage, and reserve cash stores had been drained because of the repairs. The board threatened him almost daily. Julian Bennett’s and George Winchester’s polite words around the meeting table didn’t erase the knowledge that they wanted to pick the bones of his failure.
The bickering increased. Grew louder. Became even more insulting. The barely civilized fervor grated over his skin and dug into his brain, until it was too much.
“Enough! You sound like lads fighting in a park. This is supposed to be a business meeting, for Christ’s sake.”
“Well, then, talk business.” Bennett leaned forward over his sizable paunch. “Any progress been made on the sabotage at your factory?”
“I’m not at all of a mind to have such vandalism revisited,” said Frankie McGovern. The hard Highland accent matched the sharpness in his eyes. Even Alex’s father had not revealed such a cutthroat expression. “Neither, I believe, does your board of directors.”
“My investigation is proceeding. In fact, a lead has given me hope I’m growing closer to discovering the man’s identity.”
“Lead?” Bennett raised his eyebrows. “Do tell.”
“I have reason to believe a man named Jack Findley was involved.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Bennett said with a laugh. “Findley is my overseer. Where did you get the idea he was involved?”
“Where do you get the idea that his position at your mill exempts him from suspicion?”
The hulking man leaned his elbows against the table. His tight, beady little eyes were swallowed by his cheeks when he smiled. “It doesn’t. But perhaps you’d like to know that Findley was at Idle Michael’s the night Tommy Larnach threatened to burn down your mill. He said it right there in front of Findley, bragging to anyone who’d listen.”
“My sources within the police regard him as the prime suspect,” Winchester added. “Ask that Gowan girl you’re so close with these days. See what she says about how Larnach has no alibi for the morning of the explosion.”
Tommy had been at the union meeting. What had he and Polly really argued about? Perhaps Alex had got it wrong from the start. Walt Nells could’ve told him about Findley for reasons other than protecting Polly. Maybe he knew that, as a shipbuilder, his suspicions about Tommy would have been received poorly by the weaver’s union. His reference to Jack Findley may have been a roundabout way of indicting Tommy without betraying anyone outright.
What did that say about Polly? She’d been willing to risk a great deal at Old Peter’s. Had she been duped by Tommy? Possible, given their long history. Alex thought she would keep hunting for the saboteur, even if the guilty party proved to be her first lover. About that, however, he had no proof—only the hope she was as good as her word.
“I will ask her,” Alex said at last. His throat burned and his head throbbed. “Many tasks occupy my time, but none rivals bringing the responsible party to justice.”
“Unless it’s tupping a certain union girl.” Winchester’s posh tones added an extra layer of filth to his words.
Alex stanched an impulse to choke the bastard. “We can remain civil, or we can step outside. I don’t appreciate baseless accusations. And surely it would make sense for the rest of you to help solve this mystery. All of your factories could be at risk.”
“That’s true, Christie,” Bennett said. “And Larnach is our man. The constables are on constant lookout, but he seems to have vanished. We’ll breathe easier once he’s locked up for good.”
Alex stood. The building bore his family name, and his patience had been scraped raw. He spread his hands flat on the table and leaned into his stance. He’d seen his father affect just such a pose over his huge mahogany desk, which had been intimidating as hell even as an adult.
“Make no mistake,” he said. “When discussing matters that involve my business, I am the final word.”
“You’ll check that attitude right now, if you know what’s best for your bottom line.” Fat, frustrating Julian Bennett did not blink when he challenged Alex. “Shall I explain why?”
“Do try.”
“The eight of us represent the last holdouts of textiles in Glasgow. If you cannot align your interests with ours, then Christie Textiles will fall outside of the protections that come with collective bargaining. You’ll be at the mercy of the union, rather than the other
way around. Then God help you, man. Your board of directors will eat you alive.”
“The union has yet to approach any of us with demands, concerns, or ultimatums of any kind. Why borrow trouble?”
Bennett smiled. “Because of the pay decrease.”
“I still don’t see why it’s necessary,” Alex said, repressing his growing frustrations.
Frankie McGovern opened a cigar case and set about lighting one. “My dear Mr. Christie, the price of our goods is slipping, especially now that the Americans compete on such a massive scale. To save costs, we’re cutting wages by ten percent and reducing staff by an equal percentage. In four weeks.”
Alex’s gut coiled. How much would ten percent affect Polly and her family? Or anyone in his employ? He couldn’t begin to imagine what a ten percent reduction in the workforce would do to Calton. Were these reasonable cuts or petty punitive means of imposing the masters’ authority?
“We had it mistaken, gentlemen,” he said. “My failure to discover the saboteur does not stand as your biggest threat of violence. They’ll strike.”
Bennett banged his meaty fist on the tabletop. “Then we’ll crush them until they cannot strike. The police will be involved. The ringleaders in jail. They must understand the consequences for standing in the way of progress.”
Or profit.
That word had the power to shock Alex to stillness. What was he doing arguing against such measures? He was in Scotland to earn a profit. Nothing else mattered.
Or at least, nothing else should matter.
He gathered his hat, greatcoat, and attaché. God, he was angry. He wanted just one man in the room to look at him the wrong way. No one did. The decision was his to make.
“Very well. Have it your way. With the consequences on all our heads.” Alex tipped his hat. “Good day, gentlemen.”
He strode out of the room, needing air and time to calm down. His true colors—bloody and dark—yearned to take control. There in an austere meeting room, his first instinct had been toward violence. Findley and Larnach. Winchester, Bennett, and the specter of Josiah Todd.