by Sharon Rowse
O’Hearn looked astonished, then disappointed. “But I didn’t cover that story. You need to talk to Mr. Thompson. That murder is his story.”
“But you wrote about the recent arrival of the Empress of India, didn’t you? And the loss of that poor Chinese man? I’m sure it was you whose name was on that article.”
“Emily, that was Bertie’s cousin, wasn’t it? Didn’t you tell me he was lost from that ship?” Clara asked. She still looked uncomfortable about finding herself in such surroundings, but she had been following the discussion carefully.
Emily ignored her.
O’Hearn looked at Emily and frowned. “But I don’t understand. What does my article have to do with Jackson’s death? Or are you following up on the disappearance of the Oriental? And who is Bertie?” He paused, and his eyes narrowed. “Hold on a minute. . . . It was the same day, wasn’t it? Jackson was killed the day the India docked.”
Emily nodded, pleased he’d seen the same connection she had. He might know nothing about Mr. Jackson, but he had seemed to know his way around the wharves, and she needed someone with that knowledge as much as she needed someone who could connect seemingly unrelated facts. “Yes. I wondered what was happening at the docks that night, and why Mr. Jackson was there at all. The article on the murder didn’t say, and if Mr. Thompson had known he would have said, wouldn’t he?”
“Probably. But why are you interested? I mean, they have the killer in jail, right?”
“The police think so.”
“But you don’t?”
She shook her head.
“Why not?”
Emily had given considerable thought as to how much to tell this reporter about Mr. Granville, and had decided it was better to keep him in the dark for now. It would probably intrigue him, she decided. “I’d rather not disclose that.”
And she was right. “A woman of mystery, eh?” He grinned at Emily. “You’ve just found yourself a reporter.”
She smiled back. “Good. Where will you start?”
“Why not with the missing cousin? And who is Bertie?”
He was tenacious, which was probably a good thing, but she wanted him focused on Mr. Jackson’s killer. “No one who can’t wait.”
Undaunted, O’Hearn pulled out a notebook. Pencil poised, he told her, “I still need the facts.”
“Oh, very well,” Emily said, recognizing a spirit as inquisitive as her own. “Bertie is our Chinese houseboy. His cousin was to have arrived on the India that same day, but was apparently lost at sea.”
O’Hearn nodded. “Yes, they think he fell overboard.”
“Except that Bertie’s cousin was afraid of water, and would never willingly have gone up on deck, and he had a great deal of raw opium with him, which also appears to have vanished.”
O’Hearn let out a long, low whistle. “This could be a great story.”
“Except you can’t publish anything, not until we know what happened.”
He nodded slowly. “If it was foul play, we wouldn’t want to print anything that might alert the perpetrators.”
Emily let out a relieved breath. For a moment, she’d wondered if she’d told him too much. “Exactly,” she said.
“Besides, it will make a much better story when the mystery is solved, especially if the disappearance ties into Jackson’s death.”
“Do you see the two events as related?”
“Probably not, but what if they were? That’s a big story, the kind that makes reputations around here.”
“Where would you look for a possible connection?”
Clara had been watching them both with fascination. “It’s what you’ve been saying—it’s about the India,” she said,
O’Hearn gave her an approving glance. “Right. And the timing is interesting, since by the time the ship docked, Jackson was already dead.”
“But you still don’t know that Mr. Jackson had anything to do with the India,” Emily said.
“He was in the area. Why else would he be there?”
She looked at him smugly. “Yes, that was my point exactly. We need to know why Mr. Jackson was on the docks.”
O’Hearn grinned. “OK, so that’s where I’ll start. I’ll go down to the docks, see what I can uncover.”
“We’ll come with you,” Emily said, then laughed at the expressions of horrified disapproval that both O’Hearn and Clara turned her way.
“It isn’t safe,” O’Hearn blurted out. “Especially not when it’s getting foggy.”
“That’s just a mist. Besides, it is still daylight, and you are planning to go.”
“But I’m a man,” O’Hearn said, as if that answered everything.
And perhaps in his eyes it did. It wasn’t an argument Emily had time to take on, not with Mr. Scott’s life at stake. “Very well,” she said, with a delicate sigh that had Clara looking at her askance. “When will you be able to tell me what you’ve found?”
O’Hearn looked horrified again. Clara only rolled her eyes. Emily made a mental note never to underestimate her friend. Before O’Hearn could argue, Emily said, “After all, I’m supplying you with important information. Surely I at least deserve to know what you’ve found.”
O’Hearn didn’t look convinced. “I suppose so,” he said. “Why don’t we meet here, tomorrow afternoon?”
“I have a better idea,” Emily said. “Why don’t you tell me who you’ll be questioning. Then I’ll know which of Mr. Jackson’s former associates I should be talking to.”
“But you can’t,” O’Hearn said. “It isn’t safe.”
“Surely you don’t expect me to sit quietly and wait until you return with news?”
Since this was clearly what he had been expecting, it left him uncertain how to proceed. “It’s too dangerous,” he tried out. “No one will talk to a woman. Not a chance,” he finished more confidently.
Luckily for Emily, it seemed O’Hearn had grown up without sisters. “Very well, then. We’ll just accompany you now and let you ask the questions. It will be much safer.”
O’Hearn turned slightly green. Emily was enjoying herself too much to stop now, but Clara took pity on him. “Why don’t you meet us for tea tomorrow, at Stroh’s? Perhaps at two o’clock?”
O’Hearn nodded in relief, and Clara looked over at Emily and winked. Emily ignored her, standing to shake hands with O’Hearn.
“It’s been a pleasure, Miss Turner. Miss Miles,” he said as he walked them to the door.
T W E N T Y – S E V E N
Granville opened his eyes to utter darkness. His mind felt numb; he couldn’t see or hear. What’s wrong with me? was his first panicked thought. Then, as his brain started to sort out the information his other senses were processing, “Where am I?” He said it aloud, just to see if he could hear himself. To his great relief, he not only heard the words, he heard a faint echo of them. He must at least be alive, he figured.
He was lying on his back in a confined space. It felt as if freezing water had seeped into his clothes and all around him was the odor of damp and mold, underlaid with the stench of sewage and rotting fish. From the smell, he was somewhere near False Creek, probably Chinatown or close to it. He tried to lift his head and instantly regretted it, as a red stab of pain shot through his head.
Falling back onto the damp ground, he took several deep breaths, waiting for the pain to subside. With one hand he carefully felt the large lump on the back of his head. He then felt for his gun, encountering the empty holster with no sense of surprise. Whoever had hit him would have taken the gun.
He searched his foggy brain. He remembered leaving Smythe’s office, but what had happened next? Another memory returned, and Granville tried sat bolt upright, then clutched at his head. Where was Trent?
“Trent?” he called. It came out as a cracked whisper. Running his tongue around dry lips, he tried again. “Trent? Are you here?”
Nothing. Not even a rat scuttled in the thick silence. If Trent was here, he was unconscious or w
orse. Cautiously Granville stretched his right hand into the darkness, feeling a rough board wall less than six inches from where he lay. It ran up about five feet, where it intersected with more boards above him. His gut tightened. Stretching out his left hand confirmed his suspicions; he was in a cellar, and he was alone. So where was the kid?
Perhaps they’d grabbed him and left Trent. They hadn’t bothered to tie him up, which meant they didn’t expect him to escape. They might not have worried about the boy, if it was himself they were interested in.
He swallowed, trying to bring moisture to his parched mouth and throat. How had his captors gotten him here? It had still been daylight when he’d left Smythe’s office, so anyone carrying an unconscious man would have stood out. Who had abducted him like this, and why? Gipson was the obvious choice, but hadn’t they sealed a temporary truce?
There had to be a pattern, a connection he was missing. Why wasn’t he dead? Why just confine him? It made no sense, unless . . . He did a mental calculation. Scott had four days left before his trial and almost certain hanging.
What if whoever had grabbed him didn’t need him dead, just out of the way until after the trial? Once Scott was hanged, they’d expect him to give up the search for Jackson’s killer. They’d be wrong. If his friend died for this, he wouldn't stop until the killers were also dead.
But he had only four days left to save Scott.
The thought galvanized him. Ignoring the hot spear in his brain, he got his feet under him, then slumped back against the wall behind him until his breath returned. Gritting his teeth, he moved forward onto his knees and crawled around the confines of the enclosure, testing the strength of the walls as he went. They held firm, not giving at all until he reached what had to be the door, a two-foot-wide section of planks that ran vertically. He ran his fingers around its edges. The hinges and its fastening were on the outside, beyond his reach. Using his legs to provide momentum, Granville slammed his shoulder into the door.
Nothing; no movement, no give. When the fireworks in his head subsided, he tried again, and again, until finally the lack of any change in the door’s structure convinced him he was wasting his time.
He collapsed on the floor, out of breath and dripping with sweat. When his head had stopped swimming and he had his breath back, he began to yell. He yelled until he was too hoarse to yell any longer, then tried whistling, but his mouth was too dry for more than a couple of halfhearted efforts. There was no response.
Lying exhausted in the thick darkness, Granville began to curse, using every pithy phrase he’d learned in the Klondike. Was this how it would end, with him helplessly imprisoned while Scott died? In his head, he heard the echo of William’s voice, at its most condescending, “Whenever things get too difficult, you give up.” As his brother’s words repeated themselves in his mind, the truth of them a matter for dispute at any moment but this one, he stared into the blackness.
It was Edward’s agonized face he saw, Edward’s hand clutching the pistol. They had grown up together, the two of them. Yet when Edward needed him the most, Granville had failed him. Oh, he’d said all the right things, but at the crucial moment he hadn’t defended his oldest friend, and polite society had condemned Edward for cheating at cards. Edward couldn’t live with the shame.
He had hated himself that day. He still did. He’d failed Edward, failed him when it most mattered, and there were no second chances. That knowledge had driven him to the Yukon, but he hadn’t left his guilt behind. He couldn’t get Edward’s face out of his mind, or the condemnation in Julia’s eyes when he’d told her her brother was dead. Edward and Julia were both there, staring at him in the darkness.
Granville swallowed hard. There was nothing he could do for Edward, but Scott was still alive, and he wasn’t going to give up on him. He wouldn’t let another friend die.
Closing his eyes, he took a slow breath, then another, closing out the pounding in his head, the aching in his shoulder, the fear he felt for Scott, the hopelessness. He still had four days, ninety-six hours.
After striving and failing to see something, anything in the darkness, Granville began to examine by touch every inch of his cage. There had to be a weakness here somewhere that he could exploit. He was going over everything for the second time when he found it; the boards to the left of the door did not quite meet the floor, and the ground beneath them seemed softer.
He began to dig, scrabbling in the hard earth with his hands and then with the toe of his shoe, which he’d removed. What seemed like endless hours later, he’d excavated for himself the ability to stretch one bleeding hand beneath the wall, but it wasn’t enough; he couldn’t reach anything. With an exhausted sigh, Granville slumped back against the wall. If he didn’t rest, he couldn’t go on—and he had to go on.
Taking a series of slow, deep breaths, he resumed digging. His shoulders felt like they were on fire and his hands had gone numb, but it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered except getting out. He deepened and widened the hole he’d already made, then tried reaching through it again. Now he could reach the lower door hinge, but he couldn’t get any leverage on it. He kept digging.
On the next try, his arm went through up to the elbow and he could just grip the top part of the pin that ran through the door hinge. Numbed and frozen, he grabbed and twisted, not expecting any response, but the pin moved under his hand.
Stunned, he tried again and it gave a little more. He twisted again and pulled, then repeated the motion. The pin came free, the hinge separated. Granville withdrew his arm and leaned back against the wall, breathing heavily; now he had a chance of breaking the door free.
Taking a deep breath and bracing himself, he threw himself against the lower part of the door again. The door shuddered but held. Another hit. Another. Finally there was a loud creaking.
Ramming his aching shoulder into the door again brought a louder creaking, followed by a loud crack. He continued to throw himself against the door until suddenly it gave under his weight and he found himself sprawled in a shallow puddle in the outer room, slimy water seeping into his clothes. At the far end of this room, Granville could see a sliver of faint daylight. Gathering his feet under him, he gave a heave and was up and running toward the light, his feet splashing through puddles.
The air was cold and clammy and somewhere water was dripping. As he ran, he listened for any sound that would indicate the return of his captors, but heard nothing. He ran down a narrow hallway, emerging into an alley. The mist had thickened into a dense fog, obscuring sound, visibility, any hope of recognizing where he was.
Granville hesitated, looking one way and then the other; he couldn’t see a thing. He turned left and kept running, watching and listening hard. At best he could see two feet in front of him and he could only hope the men who had abducted him were nowhere within hearing distance.
He burst out into a street, which seemed largely deserted. Instinctively he headed left again, his feet pounding against the board sidewalk. Before he even registered a presence, he ran straight into a damp figure and bounced back a foot.
“Granville?”
“Trent? Is that you?”
Before the boy could say anything, Granville put his hand over Trent’s mouth. “All right. You can tell me everything, but we need to get away from here. I don’t know if they’re likely to come after me.”
Trent’s eyes widened and he nodded vigorously.
An hour later they were in Granville’s room, biting into hearty sandwiches of roast beef and sourdough, bottles of beer on the battered pine table under the window. “I still don’t understand why we had to eat in your rooms,” Trent complained. “The saloon is much friendlier.”
“Because we can have a private conversation here. And because until we determine who is trying to kill me, I am going to keep a low profile.”
“Oh.”
“Were you able to see who grabbed me?”
“Not really. Just the backs of two of them, and not very clearly becau
se of the mist. Then another one of them hit me and I don’t remember anything else. But I wasn’t out for very long and so I started looking for you.”
It wasn’t much help. They were both lucky their heads were so hard, but what was it all in service of? He’d been assuming Scott’s arrest was due to incompetence on the part of the police, but it was becoming increasingly clear that someone didn’t want him to find the real killer. Had Scott been set up?
Granville swallowed his last mouthful of sandwich and stood up abruptly. “Come on, Trent.”
“Where are we going?”
“The jail.”
When the jailer opened the barred door of the cell, Scott was seated on one narrow bunk, his head in his hands. Knowing that the clock was ticking just made it worse. Bad as it was to see Scott trapped like this, being forced to watch him hang was unimaginable. Edward’s face swam through Granville’s mind and he forcibly shoved the memory away.
At the slamming of the door, Scott looked up. He looked surprised and none too pleased to see them, then he took in Granville’s bandaged hands. “Granville? What are you doing here?”
“I had to find out if you were still alive and kicking before I wasted any more time trying to save your flea-bitten hide.”
“Well, the bedbugs here are trying to eat me alive, and they’re making a good feast of it, but I ain’t seen a flea for a while now.”
Granville gave a mock shudder. “Rather you than me.”
“I can order some sent down from Dawson City if you’re missing them?”
“Instead of that, why not answer some questions for me?”
Scott’s eyes narrowed. “Go ahead.”
“Could you have been set up? Someone seems to want to keep you in jail. ”
“Why do you say that?”
“I was grabbed and tossed into a locked cellar. I think they were planning to keep me there until after you were hanged.”
Scott went white under the pallor he’d gained after nearly a week in jail, but he choked out a laugh and shook his head at Granville. “That explains why you look so bad. I didn’t like to ask.”