Mittman, Stephanie

by The Courtship

  "And would I ever be seein' the boy again?" Ewing Flannigan asked in the quiet of the courtroom before Davis had a chance to show the judge the bandages that held his ribs.

  "Dinner is at three on Sundays," Cabot said from the back of the room. "If you're sober, you're welcome."

  "I'm going to sign the order, Mr. Flannigan," Judge Mallory said. "Do you understand that Mr. Whittier will then have custody of Davis Flannigan and will be responsible for his upbringing and support until he reaches his eighteenth birthday?"

  "He won't be workin' in the canneries, now, will he?" Flannigan asked Cabot. "Had a brother that lost his hand there when he was a lad."

  "No, Mr. Flannigan," Cabot agreed, "he will never work in the canneries."

  "And he's not one for vegetables," Flannigan added.

  "He'll learn," Cabot said softly, allowing Arthur to push him to the front of the courtroom. "We'll all learn."

  "Sign it," Ewing told the judge, staring at his son while the sound of Mallory's pen scratching his name onto the order filled the courtroom.

  "Just another minute, Mr. Flannigan," Cabot said as the beaten man turned to leave the courtroom. "I believe this gentleman has something for you."

  Charlotte held her breath as the court clerk handed Ewing Flannigan a summons.

  "I believe we're all wanted in courtroom number one," Cabot said, reaching out for Charlotte's hand. "That was very eloquent, my dear.

  "But never settle for flying, Charlotte, when you may soar."

  ***

  "Defense calls Ewing Flannigan to the stand," Cabot said. It had taken Cabot a while, but he'd convinced Ash that she ought to be in the courtroom to see what all her work had come to. He'd even given in and allowed her to sit at the table next to him. And so there she was, at the defense table, her leg inches from Ash's, trying to keep her eyes glued to her husband when what she wanted more than anything was to drink in the sight of Ash.

  As he swore on the Bible and took his seat in the witness box, Flannigan glared at Cabot. Behind them Kathryn sat with Davis at her side and she could hear them whispering.

  Cabot wheeled to a spot near the jury so that they would get a good look at Flannigan's face as the man answered his questions. "Please understand, Mr. Flannigan, that you are not on trial here. Would you state your occupation for the record?"

  "I'm a mail carrier," Flannigan said. He sat tall in the stand as he said it, daring Cabot to make something of it.

  Cabot did. "Just a mail carrier?" he baited Flannigan.

  "And there be no just about it," he said addressing the jury in his heavy brogue. "It's a common man that thinks bein' a mail carrier is next to bein' a pissant. Beggin' your pardon, but that's how it 'tis. Have ya any idea what a mailman's privy to? What a man who pays attention can learn just from the mail he's pickin' up and deliverin'? Love letters, past due notices, I've seen 'em all."

  "And what did you see coming and going from both the G and W warehouse and then again from offices above the Charter House Bar?" Cabot asked him.

  "I don't recall," he said, crossing his arms over his chest.

  Davis stood up and leaned forward, whispering to her. Dutifully she wrote down his request and passed it to the clerk to hand to Cabot.

  "Did you know Selma Mollenoff?" Cabot asked after he'd glanced at the note and put it in his pocket

  "I didn't kill her, Davey," Flannigan said to his son. "It weren't me and don't you be thinkin' it was."

  Beside her, Ash turned in his seat. "For God's sake, take him out of here," he told Kathryn.

  His mother rose and she and Davis argued quietly until Ewing began to talk.

  "It was that damn ladies' stuff. Those Halton pamphlets with the doctor's instructions. And those pictures of... well everyone knows what kind of information it is she's sending to ladies."

  Charlotte heard herself gasp. Selma had been one of what Charlotte always referred to as her "silent supporters"—women whose hearts were in the right place but who wouldn't stand up and be counted. But all the while Selma had appeared to be standing on the sidelines, she'd really been sending out Virginia's mailings, using Ash's office to receive the donations and disseminate the information. She'd been pulling the wool over Charlotte's eyes, and Ash's, and everyone else's too. And somehow it had cost her her life. "I saw some initials on the envelopes at both places and I couldn't help asking the lady what it was she was sending. I remember the smile she give me, and the wink, and saying she couldn't be tellin' the likes of a good Catholic like me."

  "Then how did you know what was in the envelopes?" Cabot asked.

  When Brent objected, he let it pass, but Flannigan blurted out the answer anyway.

  "I weren't openin' the mail, if that's what you're thinkin'. But glue ain't the way it used to be and every now and then a letter finds its way out of an envelope, and that's what happened once or twice with Miss Mollenoff's mail." He folded his arms across his chest, then let them drop to his sides as if it didn't matter to him anymore what people thought.

  "And what did you do about it?" Cabot asked.

  "Take the boy out of here," Ash ordered his mother.

  Cabot raised his hand. "Let him be," he said to Ash, and then addressed the witness again. "You didn't do anything about it, did you, Mr. Flannigan? Neither my client nor you would have hurt Selma Mollenoff for the world."

  "That, sir, Mr. Whittier, is the God's honest truth. I'd as soon have cut off me own arm as hurt a hair on that woman's head, no matter how misguided her efforts mighta been."

  "Unless of course, you were drunk and showing off, which you were, weren't you?"

  "I've been know to tip a few, as you well know. But I had nothing to do with the fires."

  "I'm not accusing you of setting the fires, Mr. Flannigan. But you were drunk and shooting off your mouth a bit, weren't you?"

  "And how was I to know that it would lead to this? Fires and killin' and him bein' blamed?" He pointed at Ash. Charlotte came to attention and leaned forward in her seat, everything clear to her now as she silently cheered Cabot on.

  "And how do you know that this man is innocent?" Cabot asked, looking over at the table and no doubt seeing Ash's hand reach out for Charlotte's beneath the table. It didn't cost him a beat as he went on. "Please, Mr. Flannigan, for Selma's sake, don't let yet another tragedy come out of this. Someone killed that dear young lady and it wasn't my brother, was it? Tell the court how you know this man never set those fires."

  Ewing Flannigan shrugged uncomfortably. "They were braggin' in the bar, they were. How they'd stopped the sinnin' and the fornicatin'. How the 'act' was meant for makin' babies and not for women enjoyin' themselves."

  "Are you saying that these men admitted to setting fire to both warehouses in order to stop the dissemination of materials vital to the concerns of women?"

  She and Ash smiled at Cabot as they recognized her words flung out into the courtroom. Tears stung her eyes as Cabot smiled back and she gently slipped her hand from Ash's and returned it to the table.

  "Your Honor," Brent interrupted, "is this witness willing and prepared to name names?"

  Flannigan leaned back in the witness box. "I can be givin' you their names and their address at work and at home. I know how much they earn and where it is their relatives are writin' from. You know people think a mail carrier is as low as a pissant, beggin' your pardon, but—"

  Cabot put his hand up to stop Flannigan's tirade. "Your Honor, I request that all charges against my client be dropped. I could continue this case to its logical conclusion at great waste to the taxpayers of the State of California and—"

  "The state agrees to drop all charges," Brent said, "providing Mr. Flannigan here is willing to cooperate with the state in the apprehension and arrest of the party or parties responsible for the murder of Selma Mollenoff."

  "You thought I did it, didn't you, boy?" Flannigan called to Davis over the pandemonium that had broken out in the courtroom.

  Cabot reached int
o his pocket and handed Ewing the note. On it Charlotte had written Davis's request to leave his father alone. Cabot had done better. He'd exonerated him before his son's very eyes.

  ***

  They'd been lucky to get out of the courthouse alive, which was becoming the normal course of events for Charlotte these days. But this time she'd had Ash to protect her, while Moss had seen to Kathryn. At the carriage the private investigator had been waiting with a smile on his face.

  He'd shaken Cabot's hand and then Ash's. "It was a pleasure uncovering the truth for a change," he'd said to Cabot. Over his shoulder as he walked away, he'd added, "but now we're even, Whittier."

  And now they were back in the house where she and Cabot would grow old together as she'd promised. Ash had looked surprised and hurt when she'd taken the seat next to Cabot's chair in the carriage and had rested her hand on his arm all the way home. He couldn't know what it had cost her to do it, how much she longed to simply touch him, feel the texture of his skin against her palm, to look deep into his eyes and see the love she felt reflected there.

  "Charlotte, may I see you in my office?" Cabot said when they were all in the foyer and had given up coats and hats to Rosa and Arthur. "There are a few papers before we're quite finished with this whole affair."

  "Couldn't they wait?" Kathryn asked. "It's quite the day for celebration."

  "Indeed it is," Cabot said, but his face didn't match his words. "We won't be long."

  "Davis, why don't you see if you can find Van Gogh?" Charlotte suggested. "I've made him a bed in the carriage house." At the mention of the carriage house her insides tightened. If she lived here until she was a hundred, nothing on earth would send her into that building again.

  "Bring him back into the main house," Cabot told the boy. "With this extra wheel I think we can manage to stay out of each other's way."

  Charlotte felt her jaw drop, and drop again, farther, when Davis answered, "Yes, sir, Mr. Whittier."

  Cabot nodded at the boy. "I owe you one of those little circles in my chair, son," he said, indicating one with his pointer finger. "Remind me tomorrow."

  "Charlotte?" Ash whispered from just behind her. "Haven't you told him about how you feel? Doesn't he know about us?"

  "Oh, he knows," she said softly, allowing herself the luxury of looking at his incredible face before pulling away. "And you're free. But I'm not."

  He looked more angry than hurt as she pulled away to answer Cabot's call.

  "Charlotte? Are you coming?"

  "Yes," she called to him, hurrying to his office without looking back.

  He was waiting for her there, in the semidarkness, and watched her every move as she came into the room.

  "Sit," he said, and gestured toward the chair across from his desk as if that weren't where she always sat when she worked with him.

  She did as she was told.

  "You were perfection in the courtroom today," he said, referring to the job she'd done on Davis's case. He was studying her hair, her eyes, staring at her shirtwaist, considering her hands.

  She complimented him back. "As were you." She shifted in her seat. Was he imagining how it would be between them now? Now that Ash would be off to sea again and they would be alone at Whittier Court?

  "Ah, well, it was your work that set me on the right track. I couldn't have done it alone." He pulled his eyes from her and began to go through the papers that cluttered his desk, reaching for books behind him and making notes.

  "What is it that we still need to do?" she asked him, anxious to toast the victories and then crawl up to bed. Alone.

  "As I said, you were perfect," Cabot repeated. "I don't think before that moment in the courtroom I—"

  Things would never change for her. She would spend her days listening to Cabot analyze their cases and her nights dreaming of what might have been if things were different. "Cabot, I appreciate your praise, but they are all waiting for us. What is it we still have to do?"

  He put his hands together, almost as if he were praying, and touched his fingertips to his lips.

  "Face facts," he said, pushing a hastily scrawled document at her. "Read it."

  Across the top of the paper Cabot had written Petition for Annulment of Marriage.

  "I've loved you, Charlotte, from the day I met you. You were such a silly child then, so serious about wanting to be the best attorney in all of Oakland. I loved you when you were learning the law and I was so proud of you when you were admitted to the bar."

  "Are you saying you don't love me anymore?" she asked him, her eyes seeking out the grounds for the annulment and finding only the truth—that the marriage had never been consummated.

  "I love you more today than perhaps I ever did. Enough to open the cage, Charlotte, and let you soar."

  "I promised that I would stay," she said, reaching across the desk and feeling the warmth of his hand as he took hers.

  "It was never quite right between us, Charlotte. But it was never as wrong as when we tried to play at man and wife. That isn't the way I love you, and it will never be. I listened to you in that courtroom describe how a father should feel about his child, and for the first time since I'd married you I understood what was between us."

  He pulled a hankie from his jacket and handed it to her. Until then she hadn't realized she was crying.

  "It doesn't have to be my brother," he said softly. "You're free to go anywhere, you understand."

  "It has to be your brother." Ash's strong voice had a crack to it as he stood in the doorway.

  "I thought perhaps it did."

  "I'd promised him, Ash," she explained as he came to her side and knelt by her chair.

  "Make your promises to that Whittier," Cabot said softly, easing out from behind his desk. "Sign the paper and I'll push it through. I'd like to give you away before I take Davis to London."

  He did a small circle on his way to the office door.

  "Love this third wheel," he said, tears clearly glistening in his eyes. "I'll miss you, Charlotte, every day of my life.... Of course, while I'm in London I may be too busy.... And then there's Paris..."

  He wheeled out the door to a good deal of commotion in the foyer.

  "... and Naples... and Rome..."

  ***

  "Sounds like you're missing out on quite a lot," Ash said, rising and pulling her with him.

  "Oh, no," she disagreed, her face pressed into his chest while he stroked her back. "I've got everything I want right here."

  "I'll never be able to give you the things he did," Ash admitted with a heavy heart. "Trips to Europe, this fine house. My business is in shambles and I've nothing to offer you."

  She looked at him incredulously, then reached across her desk and picked up the teacup he had finally found to replace the one that had broken. Pressing it to her chest, she spoke softly, but her words still rang out clear. "You have the keys to my heart. You have the map to my soul."

  "It's just a teacup," he said, easing out from her grasp and putting it down so that he could take her into his arms. "I want to give you so much more."

  "I have everything I want right here," she told him, her arms around his neck. "I don't need a grand tour or a grand house if I have you."

  "Still, I could try to make it up to you," he said, tipping her head back so that he could press his lips to hers.

  "You could," she agreed.

  "I could bring you flowers," he said, his hands running through the cap of curls and pressing her lips harder against his own until he couldn't talk at all.

  "Mmm," she said again, and he pulled back just far enough to promise her chocolates.

  "Oh, chocolates too?" she said, undoing his collar button and the one beneath it so that she could reach the hairs at his throat and feel him struggle to swallow at her touch.

  "I wish I could promise you jewels and pearls," he said, pressing up against her and cupping her bottom close.

  "Is that what you think I want?" she asked, then clarified her ques
tion. "Pearls, I mean?"

  His head dipped to her shoulders, her neck. Unceremoniously he lifted her to the desk and buried his face against her bodice. "Is this what you want?" he asked.

  "Come on!" Davis yelled from somewhere a million miles away but close enough to bring them to their senses. "Cake!"

  "Come on," she said, pulling him by the hand until they were through the door, and then letting go.

  "Come on!" Liberty yelled. "Come on!"

  "I suppose this is going to be rather awkward," Ash said as he followed her, not too closely, into the foyer. He pulled her back for a second, and while he buttoned his collar he asked, "When am I supposed to show you just how much I love you?"

  In the dining room everyone who loved them both waited to help celebrate.

  "Don't worry," she said, running a finger along his neck and feeling the heat rise up to envelop her. "We'll have the rest of our lives."

  EPILOGUE

  Silver Pass, Wyoming Territory: March 1890

  "So?" Ash asked, putting his arm around Charlotte. "Was it as wonderful as you'd been anticipating?"

  "Oh, it exceeded even my highest expectations," she said with the grin that always melted his heart.

  "It was that good?"

  "Better!"

  "So then it was worth waiting for?"

  "Well, I'd have liked it a long time ago, and I still don't see why I had to wait," she admitted.

  "Was it worth coming to Wyoming for?"

  She nodded happily. "How did you like it?" she asked, batting those long eyelashes at him.

  "Well, it was hardly my first time, Charlie Russe," he said. "But, of course, having you there made it special."

  "You did vote for me, didn't you?" she asked as they left Town Hall, waving to several neighbors as they made their way down the sidewalk together.

  "Oh, being a justice of the peace hasn't been exciting enough for you? Being woken up in the middle of the night to set bail for Olaf Williamson? Being woken up in the middle of the night to see Raymond Rochman do his duty by Leila Singer? Being woken up in the middle of the night to—"