No Comfort for the Lost

by Nancy Herriman

  Lastly, she found an old set of letters from the Palmers, both Elizabeth and her husband. They bore dates from 1864, the year Celia and Patrick had first arrived in San Francisco and had met the Palmers at a function at the Chinese Mission, which Patrick had been loath to attend. There was a Christmas letter with a brief postscript in Emmeline’s hand, and an invitation to a formal holiday dinner. Patrick had been much happier to attend that event than any fetes at the Chinese Mission. Her husband, a poor Irishman who had suddenly found himself in the middle of proper society, had wanted to cultivate the Palmers’ friendship. Regrettably, Patrick had partaken too freely of the champagne that evening. Though Barbara and Celia were still welcome at the Palmers’, no more invitations came that had included him.

  The front bell rang and Addie hurried through the house to answer it, rousing Celia from her recollections. She put away the files and examined the papers spread beneath the glow of the desk lamp. She set the note at the center of her desk, sat in her chair, and began working through each piece of communication, relegating them to one of three categories: possible, unlikely, and uncertain. If only the note’s author had been more verbose; five words were hardly enough when one was comparing the loops and lines of people’s penmanship.

  “What are you doing?” asked Barbara.

  Her cousin still wore her dress from church that morning, the floral-print aqua-on-cream with the beautiful aqua lace trim that was her favorite gown and usually made her smile. She was not smiling now. “It has to do with that note, doesn’t it?”

  Before church that morning, Barbara had overheard Celia telling Addie to take a message to Mr. Greaves informing him of the warning they’d received. They hadn’t succeeded in keeping the news from Barbara for long.

  “I am attempting to discover who may have written it by comparing the handwriting,” said Celia.

  Barbara crossed the room. “Do you think this is wise, Cousin? If we’re in danger, we shouldn’t be trying to discover who sent the warning. We should tell the police and leave it at that.”

  “If I do not help the police identify the author, Barbara, what will stop the culprit from returning?” Celia considered the stacks of notes. Two uncertains—a letter from one of the society ladies and an invoice from the coal man—and thirteen unlikelies. She could already see that the remaining two, the notes from the Palmers, would bear no fruit.

  Barbara looked over Celia’s shoulder. “Have you found a match?”

  “Not among our acquaintances, no.”

  “I guess it’s good it didn’t come from somebody we know.”

  “The author still could be someone we know, Barbara,” Celia explained. “They simply may be clever enough to disguise their handwriting.”

  Barbara stared at the warning note. “Maybe we should leave town until Tom’s trial is over.”

  “I cannot leave, Barbara. I have patients who need me.”

  “Mr. Palmer wouldn’t make Em stay if she wanted to leave.”

  “Now, Barbara—”

  “He wouldn’t. He’s too kind. Kinder than you! You only care about your patients and nobody else!” Barbara stumbled out of the room, bumping into Addie, who was coming in from the vestibule.

  Addie stared after her. “Now, what has provoked her to say such things?”

  “This is one of those times, Addie, when I wish that assuming the guardianship of a teenaged girl had come with an instruction manual,” said Celia, dropping the Palmers’ letters onto the unlikely stack. “She wants to leave town, but it’s not possible. My patients rely on me to be here.”

  “Are you nae worried it would be unsafe to stay, ma’am?”

  “I will admit I am a little afraid, but I cannot go.”

  “Then perhaps the braw policeman I’ve shown to the side yard might be willing to stand guard,” Addie suggested with a wink.

  • • •

  The braw policeman was slowly traversing the narrow side yard, inspecting both the flagstone path Uncle Walford had laid down and the dirt on either side of it. How revealing it was that when Addie had mentioned a handsome policeman, Celia had hoped it was Nicholas Greaves.

  Addie stood to one side as Celia greeted Officer Taylor. “I was not certain anyone would be at the station on a Sunday to get my message,” she said.

  “I always come in for a spell on Sundays, ma’am. Don’t have a wife or kids at home to mind.”

  A piece of news that visibly cheered Addie, causing her to fuss with her hair. Officer Taylor wasn’t at all bad looking and must earn a nice living. He would be a good catch for Addie, who’d come to America seeking a better life, leaving behind a cramped turf-roofed farmhouse in rural Scotland and the poverty that had starved her and her eight brothers and sisters.

  While Officer Taylor scouted the side yard for clues, Celia glanced up and noticed Angelo peeking around the curtain in the Cascarinos’ second-story window. Most of the others had gone out for the day, but Angelo must have had another sore throat and been forced to stay behind with his mother. Once the rest of his family returned home, he could boast about getting to watch the policeman do his work at Mrs. Davies’ next door.

  Officer Taylor squatted on his heels next to a footprint stamped into the ground. City soil was as hard as stone in the summertime, and her uncle had worked in clay and compost in an effort to get anything other than weeds to grow. As it was, only a few shoots of Bermuda grass poked up their heads. The soil was soft, however, from the recent rains, and the passage of feet that had wandered off the flagstones had left clear imprints.

  “Who’s been through this way recently, Mrs. Davies?” he asked.

  Addie spoke before Celia could open her mouth to answer. “Since yesterday’s rain, only the lad athwart the way, Officer Taylor. He came by in the afternoon yesterday to deliver some eggs from the chickens his mother keeps in their yard.”

  “But no men?” He stood again and placed his own foot next to the print, which was an inch or so longer than Officer Taylor’s boot.

  “You are certain that print was left by a man, Officer Taylor?” Celia asked.

  “Yes, ma’am. A workingman’s heavy boots, I’d say.”

  “You do not think it could have been a woman wearing a man’s boots?” she asked. Because it would not take much to slip on a pair in order to complete a disguise.

  Officer Taylor peered at her warily. “Don’t think I’ve ever heard of somebody doing that, ma’am.”

  “In that case, to answer your earlier question,” said Celia, “it’s been some time since a man came through the side yard. Two months ago when we had an oil delivery would be the last.”

  “Would you like me to fetch the neighbor’s laddie to see if his shoes match the print?” Addie asked, surprising Officer Taylor with an understanding of what he was looking for.

  “That’s mighty kind of you, Miss Ferguson.”

  Addie smiled coyly and dashed through the side yard, dodging the footprints by staying on the flagstones, and slipped through the gate to the street.

  Officer Taylor, fumbling in his coat pockets, cleared his throat and glanced anxiously at Celia.

  “I am not going to get light-headed again as I did in the police station,” she assured him, “if that is what’s concerning you.”

  “Um, no, ma’am. I mean . . .” He produced a cigar and a friction match, which he struck against the house’s brick wall. He lit the cigar and puffed furiously. “I plumb forgot what I was thinking about.”

  “Here is the note we received, by the way,” said Celia, handing it to him.

  Officer Taylor studied it for far longer than it took to read five words. “Why do you reckon this fellow wants to warn you that you could be the next victim?” he asked around the cigar clenched in his teeth.

  “Possibly because my cousin, Barbara, is half-Chinese and the anti-coolie folks are after her,
” she said. “Or because of my relationship with Li Sha. The author might be the killer and believes I have knowledge of his or her identity.”

  “Hmm. I’ll have to ask Mr. Greaves what he thinks, ma’am.” Officer Taylor struck a contemplative stance, a stream of smoke issuing from between his lips, and tucked the note into an inner pocket of his overcoat. “Yep.”

  Celia figured that Nicholas Greaves would have definite thoughts on the matter, and those thoughts would include reminding her that he’d told her not to interfere in his investigation.

  Addie returned with the neighbor’s boy, his black hair hanging down over his goggling eyes. She guided him into the yard, pointing out to him that he was to avoid stepping in the dirt.

  “We just want to see if your feet are the same size as these prints here, Joaquín,” said Celia.

  “I am not in trouble?” he asked haltingly.

  “No,” she answered.

  He did as asked and confirmed that his kip boots were much smaller than the prints. Which also meant the prints weren’t left by Owen, who was no larger than her Chilean neighbor, when he’d come by yesterday.

  “Thank you,” said Celia. Joaquín ran off. “No one else has been in the yard since last night, Officer Taylor. As a precaution, we locked the gate once we received the note.”

  “What will you do now, Officer Taylor?” asked Addie. “Can you find this person?”

  “Boot prints don’t tell us much, Miss Ferguson. Wish they did.”

  “I’ve been thinking since last night, ma’am, that the intruder could be one of Owen’s mates,” Addie said to Celia. “Maybe they discovered Owen was spying on them and told us about their plans!”

  Officer Taylor withdrew a notebook. “What’s this?”

  Celia recounted what Owen had shared yesterday. “I told Addie I doubted those men would warn us, however. I think they would simply go ahead and burn down our house.”

  “You’ve got a point there,” he agreed. “And we’ve heard of this Connor fellow. Connor Ahearn is his name. One of your brother-in-law’s friends, as it turns out, and tied in tight with the anti-coolie agitators.”

  A friend of Tom’s? Why was she not surprised? Celia thought cynically.

  “We’re going to see Madame Philippe—she’s a famous astrologer—in a couple of days,” said Addie. “Think we should ask her who did this?”

  “Uh . . .” Officer Taylor was so taken aback by her comment, he forgot to puff his cigar. “An astrologer?” He seemed to struggle not to laugh.

  “Thank you so much for your help, Officer Taylor,” said Celia before Addie could blurt a caustic retort. “We shall keep the gate and our doors firmly locked at night.”

  “Good idea, ma’am. And I hear the funeral’s tomorrow,” he said. “You might want to keep a sharp lookout there for any strangers. I hear sometimes the killers like to spy on their victims’ funerals.”

  “I shall inform you or Mr. Greaves if I notice any such person.”

  Officer Taylor returned to smoking and headed toward the gate Addie had left open. Celia followed him. Upstairs at the Cascarinos’, Angelo had abandoned his post at the window. After Officer Taylor departed, Celia would have to go to see how the boy was feeling. Watching where she stepped so she did not destroy the evidence, Celia passed through the gate ahead of the officer, who held it wide for her.

  The family who’d recently moved into a house across the street scurried down their steps, dressed in bright Sunday-picnic colors. Joaquín’s mother, her own skirts a kaleidoscope, stood in the middle of the wood pavement and glowered in Celia’s direction. She must be upset that a policeman had sent for her son. The family spilled around the Chilean woman like a stream rushing around a boulder, the children running pell-mell down the hill. The street fell quiet again, as it often did on Sundays. A quiet so thorough that Celia found it eerie.

  She nodded at Joaquín’s mother, who glowered more fiercely and climbed the steps to her house.

  “Hey, now, what’s this?” Officer Taylor was saying. He bent down to dig something out of a clump of grass. It was the dirty stub of a cigar. He held it between forefinger and thumb and sniffed it. “A good one. And it’s not wet. Only been lying here, I’d say, since the rain yesterday.”

  “Could it have been dropped by the person who left the note?” asked Celia.

  “Mighta been.” He opened his coat and stashed the butt in an inner pocket. “Know any folks who wear heavy boots and smoke cigars?”

  “Besides you, Officer Taylor?”

  He flushed. “Other than me, ma’am.”

  “Any number of men of my acquaintance smoke cigars and cigarillos and cheroots. Maybe even some of Owen’s older mates,” she added, contradicting her earlier contention that those men would not leave warnings.

  “We’ll figure it out, ma’am. Me and Mr. Greaves.”

  “I hope so,” she responded. “Because I do not care to have become a target.”

  • • •

  “Your landlady told me I could find you here, Mr. Ahearn.”

  Connor Ahearn sat alone at a table enjoying a cut of beef with potatoes and peas, a very nice Sunday meal for a machinist at the ironworks. The two companions who’d been sitting with him when Nick entered the chophouse had retreated to a table by the window. Far enough away to stay out of Connor Ahearn’s business, close enough to come to his aid if the need arose.

  “Yeah, did she, then?” Ahearn eyed Nick with no apparent concern. A brawny man, he wore a neatly trimmed beard and had short auburn hair beneath the cap he hadn’t removed. He also had on a bright yellow-and-red-checked vest, just like the man Celia Davies had seen in the Barbary with Tessie Lange. Finishing off his attire was a leather holster, complete with a bowie knife, which he’d strapped around his waist.

  The roar of conversation in the restaurant had quieted to a whispering hum since Nick had walked over to Ahearn’s table. Somewhere off to his left, a man stood to leave, his bill paid with a jingle of coins upon the table.

  “You’re makin’ me nervous, Detective. Pull up a chair and rest yer feet, will ya?”

  “I’ll stand.” Nick’s elbow bumped against his holstered Colt police revolver.

  Ahearn’s eyes flicked in the gun’s direction. “You gonna shoot me, Detective? I’m just havin’ some food here on a fair Sunday, and you’re gonna shoot me.” He turned to a man seated at an adjacent table. “Faith an’ all, he wants to shoot me. And what have I done, I ask you?”

  The fellow shrugged, while the proprietor, standing behind the bar where he served beer on other days, gaped. Maybe he was afraid for the large framed mirror hanging on the wall behind him, in case gunfire erupted.

  “Tell me about Li Sha,” said Nick.

  Ahearn let the man at the neighboring table return to his food, though the fellow looked like he no longer wanted to eat. “Who?”

  “The Chinese girl who was killed last Monday.”

  Ahearn sawed at his beef. “Don’t know her.”

  “Well, isn’t that funny, because I’ve heard you hated her.”

  “Now, who would be sayin’ that?” he asked, chewing, the muscles in his heavy jaw flexing.

  “What about Thérèse Lange? You know her, don’t you?”

  Ahearn set down his knife and fork, the handles clinking against the plate, and swiped a napkin over his mouth. The tension rose in the room, turning as thick as the humidity on an Ohio August day. “If I do, that’d be between me and Miss Lange, Detective Greaves.”

  “You were spotted talking to her on Thursday. What was that about?” Nick asked, wanting Ahearn’s version of events.

  “Nothing in particular,” Ahearn answered calmly.

  “You two weren’t discussing Li Sha?”

  “There you are, askin’ me about her again, Detective Greaves.”

  “If you kn
ow Tessie Lange, you have to have known Li Sha, since Tessie’s father employed the girl.”

  “So that’s the China girl yer talkin’ about!” He went through the motions of looking amazed. “’Tis a small world, then, isn’t it?”

  “Did you ever happen to use her services when she was a prostitute?”

  Ahearn blinked slowly, but his breathing had sped up. “What would my blessed mother have to say about me doin’ such a thing?”

  “I don’t know. Probably nothing good,” replied Nick. “What did you think of a Chinese woman, a former prostitute, working in a white man’s store?”

  “Like a lot of people, I think the Chinese are takin’ our work and takin’ food from our own mouths.”

  Ahearn, though, wasn’t suffering from a lack of food. “Is that why people say you hated her, or is it because Tessie hated her? She was jealous that Li Sha was with your friend, Tom Davies, her former beau, wasn’t she? So the two of you, what? Plotted to lure the girl to someplace near the wharf, killed her, and then dumped her body in the bay. Is that how it worked?”

  “Is that what she’s sayin’?”

  “I’m giving you a chance to help me understand what did happen.”

  “You know, I would be suggestin’ you leave, Detective.” Ahearn’s hands curled into fists and he pushed his chair away from the table. The proprietor made an anxious noise and started clearing glasses off the bar top, storing them as quickly as he could behind the bulk of the walnut counter.

  Ahearn stood and Nick shoved him back into his chair. It rocked on its back legs. “I’m not done yet, Ahearn.”

  “I think I’ll be complainin’ about how you’re treatin’ me here.”

  He probably would.

  “Are you a member of the Anti-Coolie Association? I’ve heard you’re organizing a ward chapter. I wonder what you’re planning. Care to tell me?” asked Nick, feeling every eye in the place on them. Some might be hoping he’d pull out his gun and do some shooting, just to liven up a dull Sunday afternoon.