“Oh.” I felt like a fool. I’d grown up in the desiccated splendor of Whyborne House, but in my student days, I’d lived in a small room in a boarding house, on a diet consisting largely of beans and bread. I’d thought myself practically a martyr at the time. But my clothes had been clean, and I’d spent my days studying with some of the foremost scholars in America.
In truth, there had never been any real danger of falling too far. Mother might have had to pay for my education by selling her own jewelry, but if I’d ever found myself in dire need, I had only to humble myself by showing back up at the door to Whyborne House and apologizing to Father. It might have meant a certain death of the soul, but at least I wouldn’t have starved.
We walked farther into the settlement. No men besides ourselves seemed to be about; no doubt they worked in the mine, for the most part, or fed the coke ovens, or ran the machine shops. Domestic chores occupied the women: sweeping the coal dust from their stoops, hanging out the wash, working the small gardens, or carrying pails of water.
Our first destination was the home of Rider Hicks, the runaway Indian. Griffin had asked a few casual questions of one of the hotel porters, and discovered Mrs. Hicks remained behind in Threshold.
Griffin led the way to the line of houses nearest to the coke ovens. These, I could not help but notice, were exclusively the domain of immigrants and blacks—and presumably Indians, as Rider Hicks had lived here. The ash from the ovens laid a greasy film over every surface, and formed a scum on the pools of standing water.
I spotted Mr. Fredericks and two other Pinkerton guards standing in front of a house. The house itself was the neatest I’d yet seen in the ramshackle town, cheerfully painted and surrounded by patches of flowers, which had managed to bloom where others had only withered.
The presence of the Pinkertons couldn’t be a good sign. Griffin and I exchanged a look and picked up our pace.
“You’ve got fifteen minutes,” Fredericks said as we came up. “So shut your damn mouth and get to it.”
The object of his ire was a young black woman, whose dress and headscarf were worn from many washings, but patched with careful stitches and spotlessly clean even amidst these surroundings. Her eyes went wide as if with fear, and she clutched an infant to her breast, as though seeking to protect it from Fredericks.
I disliked the smug expression on Fredericks’s face. His companion held a shotgun loosely in one hand, which made me no happier.
“What’s going on here?” I asked, more sharply than I’d intended.
Fredericks tipped his hat at me. “Just taking care of some company business, Dr. Whyborne.”
“Business?” Griffin asked. I could feel the coiled tension in him when he stopped shoulder-to-shoulder with me.
“These houses are for miners or those who tend the coke ovens,” Fredericks said, scowling at having to explain himself. “Bertie’s man done run off, which means she’s got no right to stay here.”
“You chased him away!” she broke in. “Please, sir, I don’t have anywhere else to go! I have work—”
“This town already has plenty of whores,” Fredericks said.
My belly tightened, not just at the insult, but the dismissive way he said it. Certainly, as Mrs. Mercer had said, this was a man who didn’t care anything for the familiarity of her first name, let alone whatever identity she wished to claim. “Surely you can spare her a few days in which to find somewhere else to go.”
For the first time, he turned his full attention on me. “This ain’t a charity, Dr. Whyborne. This is a company town, and she ain’t working for the company. If Rider comes back, well, she can keep the house. Seems fair, don’t it?”
This was Rider Hicks’s wife. Was there more to this than the fact of his absence? Did someone hope he would return if his family was at risk?
“As I understand it, Mr. Hicks left town after being threatened with jail,” I said. Acid roiled in my belly. Thank goodness I hadn’t eaten the overdone eggs. “Unless you have workers waiting on housing, what harm will come from letting her stay another few days?”
Fredericks eyed us uneasily, perhaps remembering my parentage. At first, I thought he wouldn’t listen. Then he gave a single, sharp nod. “Fine. But unless Hicks is back and at work in a few days, she leaves.”
“As you say,” I agreed, knowing I was lucky to have gotten even this much.
“Come on,” Fredericks said to his men.
Once they left, I shook my head and turned back to the woman on the porch. She’d transferred her wary gaze from the Pinkertons to us, but dropped it quickly when she saw me looking. “Thank you, sir,” she said, giving as deep a curtsey as she could manage with a sleeping baby in her arms. Her voice trembled, though, and I wondered if she expected us to demand some vile repayment.
I removed my hat and stepped just close enough to have a civil conversation. “Mrs. Hicks?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said warily.
“Please, allow me to introduce myself. I am Dr. Percival Endicott Whyborne, and this is my associate, Mr. Griffin Flaherty. We’ve come to Threshold to investigate…well, any strange goings-on.”
“Your husband seemed to recognize the black stone found in the cave on Threshold Mountain,” Griffin added.
“I don’t know nothing about it,” she replied quickly.
Was she telling the truth? Considering her husband had been threatened with jail for spreading stories, I wouldn’t blame her for lying. “Mrs. Hicks, I assure you, we take this matter very seriously indeed. If you know anything at all, it would be a great help if you would tell us.”
After a long moment, she slowly shook her head. “I don’t know much, sir. Rider worried about moving here. He said the Shawnee didn’t much come into this area except for hunting, because something lived in the hills which didn’t take kindly to people. But we needed the money, and we came anyway. He didn’t say nothing more about it. Guess he didn’t want to scare me.”
My shoulders slumped. Another dead end.
Griffin glanced around carefully. He spoke in a lowered voice, as if he wished to make certain no one overheard him. “We must speak with your husband. Do you have any idea where he might be hiding?”
Mrs. Hicks’s eyes widened, and she glanced around quickly. “N-no.”
She was lying; even I could tell. “Please,” I said. “We don’t wish him any harm. I’m not allied with the Pinkertons, and you have my word neither of us will tell them or Mr. Orme. We came here to help, if we can, not make things worse by jailing the only man who might be able to tell us what’s happening.”
Her arms tightened around her baby, as if wishing to protect it from the consequences of her choice, whatever they might be. “I’m sorry, sir. I just don’t know. Now please, I got to get to work.”
Then she was gone, the door slamming shut between us.
~ * ~
Our next destination was the home of the parents of the missing brothers. Unlike Mrs. Hicks, who had clearly been terrified of us, Mrs. Kincaid gladly invited us inside her house.
“It does my heart good to know somebody besides us is worried about my boys,” she said, ushering us inside. “Now that an important man like yourself is involved, surely something will turn up, and I’ll have them home soon.”
The weight of her faith bowed my shoulders. She thought me far more than I was, far more than I wished to be. Certainly far more than I could be.
“We’ll do our best, ma’am,” Griffin said, when I failed to reply.
“Er, yes,” I agreed. “If it’s within our power.”
The house was of simple design, with a single, large, front room and two smaller rooms in the back, one of which appeared to be a kitchen. The front room had clearly been used as a bedroom for the three brothers, given the heaps of bedclothes and general untidiness. Mrs. Kincaid hurriedly cleared off two chairs for us. “Can I offer you gentlemen tea? Coffee?”
“Coffee would be lovely,” Griffin said, giving her a dazzling
smile. She blushed and smiled, taking a decade off her weary face.
A deep, wracking cough came from the back bedroom. “My husband,” she called from the kitchen. “He’s got the miner’s lung. Lots of days he can’t work anymore. That’s why I know the boys didn’t just run off like those Pinkertons say. They wouldn’t just leave us, knowing their daddy can’t work half the time.”
“Did the Pinkerton guards say why they concluded your sons ran away instead of met with foul play?” I asked. “With outlaws and other, more natural, hazards in these woods, I would have thought they would attempt a more thorough investigation.”
“Not what they’re being paid for, is it?”
“She’s right,” Griffin said with a glance at me. “They’re being paid to keep the peace in Threshold and to keep the unions out. Not investigate random disappearances.”
“But if they’re to act as the law here, surely they should do so in truth,” I objected.
Now they both looked at me pityingly. Apparently, I once again demonstrated I had no idea how the world actually worked.
Within a few minutes, Mrs. Kincaid brought our coffee. It was too sweet and full of grounds, but I choked it down with a smile.
“Do you know where your sons went to hunt?” Griffin asked. “Threshold Mountain itself, or one of the lower peaks, or…?”
She shook her head sadly. “No. I’m afraid I don’t. It couldn’t have been too far, though, because they meant to be home for dinner.”
Griffin nodded, as if she had been in any way useful. “I see. Is there anything you can tell us? Were your sons worried about something, or had they noticed anything odd? Anything which seems relevant might help.”
Mrs. Kincaid frowned, rocking back and forth on her chair, while her husband coughed and choked in the back room. “I can’t rightly think of anything. They worried about their daddy, of course, but otherwise you wouldn’t have thought they’d had a care in the world. Always laughing and playing jokes.” A fond smile creased her lips. “Everyone loved them. Oh, but would you like to see a photo? We had one made when we first got here, along with some of the other families. For the company records, they said, but we could buy a print if we wanted.”
“Please.”
She carefully took a photo in a paper frame from a drawer and brought it to us. “Here. Those are my boys: Thomas, Ben, and Lucas on the right there.”
I took the photo from her. It showed the family, standing in what was doubtless their Sunday best in front of the house. Mrs. Kincaid and her husband posed in the center, surrounded by the three boys. The one on the right, Lucas, was unfamiliar to me.
The other two, however, I knew all too well. They were the thieves who had attacked me in Widdershins and stolen the black stone.
Chapter 8
“What the devil can it mean?” Christine wondered, scowling out over the veranda toward Threshold, as if the town itself might give her an answer.
We had excused ourselves from the Kincaid home shortly after viewing the photograph, Griffin noticing my sudden anxiety. I’d had no wish to accuse Mrs. Kincaid’s sons in front of her. Or two of them, anyway; what had become of the third and youngest?
“I don’t know,” Griffin said. He leaned against the railing, peering out at the road. “But I’ve sent word to Elliot to meet us here.”
I started. “You did?”
“These circumstances are ordinary enough. Odd, but without requiring him to believe anything particularly strange is going on.”
It made sense, I supposed. Having the aid of the head of the Pinkerton division would be an asset. I should welcome his presence.
Perhaps if I kept repeating it to myself, I might even begin to believe it.
We didn’t have to wait long for his arrival. He strolled up in a cream-colored summer weight suit, with striped trousers and a colorful blue vest.
I glanced down at my attire, which consisted of differing shades of brown, and found I’d managed to splash mud all over my shoes.
Elliot greeted us cordially, but with clear puzzlement. The four of us settled on the veranda, sipping glasses of lemonade while Griffin explained the situation to Mr. Manning.
The detective frowned, turning his piercing gaze on me. “You’re certain of your identification?”
I stiffened at the implication. “Of course. I hardly think I would forget the faces of the men who assaulted and robbed me in an alleyway.”
“I mean no disrespect, Dr. Whyborne,” he said, holding up one hand.
“Whyborne isn’t given to fancies,” Christine said, coming to my defense. “The question you should be asking is why on earth would two young miners suddenly decide to follow the mysterious stone all the way to Massachusetts, without telling anyone and with no apparent motive?”
“Indeed.” He frowned in thought and sipped his lemonade. “Did you ask Mrs. Kincaid?”
Griffin shook his head. “I doubt she would have volunteered to show Whyborne the photograph if she knew anything. Nor did she strike me as a woman playing a game with us, but rather a mother genuinely worried for her sons.”
“I see.” Manning leaned back and clasped his hands over his stomach. “Dr. Whyborne, would you say the stone might have been valuable?”
“I can’t say for certain. I didn’t have the opportunity to examine it,” I replied slowly. What was he getting at?
“But it might be the sort of thing a collector would buy?”
“Possibly.”
“I think I begin to see what happened.” He nodded slowly to himself. “The Kincaid boys saw the artifact when it was brought back into town, just as everyone else did. When they heard it had been sent to Mr. Stotz, they hatched a plan to steal it. Perhaps they assumed it must be valuable, or all artifacts are, after the recent newspaper stories about Dr. Putnam’s discoveries. At any rate, it must have seemed more glamorous and profitable than mining. They took on the mantle of thieves, sneaking away without anyone’s notice, and followed the trail of the stone until they had the chance to seize it. No doubt they’ve either sold it or are trying to sell it as we speak.”
“Perhaps,” Christine said dubiously. “It seems like a great deal of persistence and trouble to go to, for three young men who’d never done such a thing before.”
“All outlaws must get their start somewhere,” Manning said with an easy smile. “And if you doubt the persistence of the criminal mind, ask Griffin about the Dixon robbery sometime.”
Griffin laughed. “I had entirely forgotten that case!”
“How could you? Don’t you recall we—”
“What about the other strange goings-on?” I broke in. “The sounds in the mine, for instance?”
Manning’s smile faded. “They have a natural explanation, just as the disappearances did. If you wish to investigate further, perhaps you should ask Mr. Orme for permission to tour the mine.”
“I think I shall,” I replied recklessly. I noticed Griffin’s face pale and immediately regretted my words.
Manning rose to his feet. “I must get back to my office in the Pinkerton barracks,” he said. “A pleasure to see you again, Dr. Putnam, Dr. Whyborne. And Griffin…thank you. You’ve only been in town for a day, and already you’ve solved an incident which has vexed me for weeks.”
Griffin returned his smile, more warmly than I liked. “I would say I learned from the best, but, in truth, happenstance led to the solution, not any investigative ability on my part.”
I waited until Manning was safely gone, before blurting out, “Surely you don’t believe his ridiculous explanation!”
Griffin gave me a startled look. “You are entirely set against it?”
“Yes.” I folded my arms over my chest and glowered at him. “Don’t you agree, Christine?”
“Hmm.” The traitor actually seemed to be considering the possibility Manning was right. “It would explain the facts, you must admit.”
“I don’t have to admit any such thing. What of the sons simply leavi
ng their parents in the lurch? There’s a fact Manning’s theory fails to cover.”
“If they believed they could get good money for the stone, their intention may have been to give a portion of it to their mother,” Griffin speculated. He sank into a chair and leaned forward, his elbows on his knees and his fingers steepled thoughtfully. “Or the family bond was not as tight as their mother believes. She would hardly be the first parent to delude herself in such a way.”
“And there is a market for artifacts, obtained legitimately or not,” Christine added.
“You’re both accepting this far too easily,” I pointed out—quite reasonably, I thought.
Griffin and Christine exchanged a glance. “Will you share your theory with us?” Griffin asked.
“Well…” Blast the man. “I haven’t had time to come up with one yet.”
“Perhaps your visit to the mine will clarify things,” Christine suggested.
Griffin blanched slightly and glanced aside. “I’ll speak to Orme tomorrow,” I said. “There’s no need for all of us to go.”
“I’m certainly not,” Christine said. “A tomb is one thing, but I’ve no intention of crawling about in a coal mine.”
“I should accompany you,” Griffin said reluctantly.
“There’s no need. Your time would be better spent talking to people.” Inspiration struck. “Perhaps you can find out what others thought of the Kincaid brothers. If it seems likely they would turn to robbery.”
He clearly didn’t like the prospect, but finally nodded. “Very well, my dear. We’ll do as you say.”
~ * ~
That night, a muffled cry awoke me.
I rolled over, and almost fell out of the dratted bed. Alone, as Griffin slipped back to his own room after we’d made love.
Griffin. Had the cry belonged to him?
I extricated myself from the twisted bed sheets. My nightshirt stuck unpleasantly to my sweaty skin as I crossed the room to the connecting door and knocked on it. “Griffin?”
There came no reply. I strained my ears, trying to catch any sound from within, or from the hall outside. Was he having one of his fits? Had anyone else heard him call out? Did I have to worry about someone knocking on his door and discovering me within, or would the fact of our connecting door be enough to avert suspicion?
Whyborne and Griffin, Books 1-3 Page 33