A Changing Light

by Edith Maxwell

  “Kevin, we can get off in Newburyport,” I blurted. The train from Amesbury had to first go slightly southeast to connect with any through lines, whether they traveled north or south. “It will arrive there in, what, twenty minutes?” I asked the conductor.

  “Fifteen,” the man said.

  “Very well.” Kevin sounded exasperated but took off for the caboose end of the train.

  “Mrs. Dodge.”

  I turned to see a breathless Mary Chatigny at my elbow. She was dressed for traveling in a sturdy brown suit and duster, and she carried a full satchel.

  “Mary, is thee taking this train?”

  “Yes. I’m late, but I’m off to a medical conference in New York City.” She lowered her voice. “What’s this about a known murderer?”

  I matched her tone. “I can’t go into detail but, yes, there’s a woman from Ottawa aboard who was responsible for this week’s homicide.”

  A steely look came into her eyes. “How can I help?”

  I liked this woman. “If thee sees a lady with pale skin and light hair, about my age and height and wearing stylish clothing, please engage her in conversation.” My words tumbled out even as I saw the conductor check his watch again. “The chief and I will be going through the cars from opposite ends.”

  “I think I’ve seen her around town. I shall board in the middle.” She strode down to the third car and climbed on without any help.

  I smiled to myself at her fortitude as I ascended onto the first car, accepting the conductor’s offer of a hand up. He fastened the heavy chain across the opening after me.

  I opened the door to the car, gazing down the length of it. This local line didn’t pull Pullman sleeper cars nor was it a luxury express train such as the one David and I had ridden to Cape Cod after our marriage, which had included lush upholstered chairs. The benches here were of a more utilitarian varnished wood.

  A thought struck me. What if Luthera had been gazing out a window on this side and seen Kevin and me arrive? Or spied him racing down the platform to the other end. Would she have hurried to descend from, say, the second car and find her way out of town by some other means? Would the conductor apprehend her? I leaned my head back out and glanced up and down, but I didn’t see her. If she had already made her getaway, perhaps the police officer at the depot door would nab her, but that depended on him recognizing her. It also depended on Luthera not talking her way out of being detained.

  The conductor climbed on. “All aboard,” he cried, leaning out from the passage between the first car and the coal car. The whistle blew, and the wheels began to move.

  I tried to still my racing heart as I moved through the aisle at a funereal pace, checking each seat for Luthera. The train picked up speed and clacked through the woods toward Salisbury. It occurred to me the murderer might have disguised herself. Or perhaps she wore a traveling hat with a veil.

  Spying someone I knew, I paused. Marie Deorocki huddled next to a window, a handkerchief to her mouth. Her shoulders heaved in a muffled cough.

  “Where is thee bound, Marie?” I asked.

  She glanced up, startled. “Hello, Rose. Dr. Chatigny convinced me I really must seek the cure at Saranac Lake.”

  “I wish thee safe travels and much healing, Marie.”

  She held up a hand in acknowledgment even as she bent over in a paroxysm of coughing. No wonder the seat next to her remained vacant. She couldn’t get to the sanitarium a minute too soon.

  I continued on my quest. At the far end of the car were sets of seats facing each other. After I passed, I peered at the backward-facing ones. No Luthera.

  Pulling open the door, I stepped onto the overlapping iron plates of the noisy open space. The connected plates were designed to slide under each other when the train took curves. I caught myself on a vertical bar when the train swerved as it turned south. We now approached the railroad bridge over the mighty Merrimack River. I held on tight. The chain across the openings on both sides was the only barrier between me and the tracks along which we raced.

  I opened the door to the second car to repeat my slow stroll. Instead I was met face-to-face with Luthera herself. Glowering, she stepped toward me, forcing me back onto the iron plates. The door closed behind her.

  “You’re in my way, nosy midwife,” she growled.

  I swallowed and stood my ground. “Please excuse me, Luthera. I’m looking for a friend.”

  Her nostrils flared. “No, you aren’t. You’re looking for me. You and the bumbling police chief.” She clasped my forearm with her left hand and pressed a gun into my neck with her right. “I’m finished with the both of you.”

  Chapter Forty-two

  The steel of the barrel pressed cold into my skin. My heart thudded. My brain raced. I would not let her kill me. Nor my baby. I swallowed down my nerves.

  “It would be a grave mistake to shoot me.” I gazed at her steely expression, her icy eyes. She had brought two guns to Amesbury? Probably. Kevin had said she was a sharpshooter. She might have even more with her. “There’s no escape for thee if thee kills again.”

  She barked out a harsh laugh. “There’s also no escape for me if I don’t. I know you’ve been assisting the police.” Her tone was deadly above the racket. Between the iron grip on my arm and the pressure of the gun, she forced me to take a step closer to the opening. Did she mean to end her own life at the same time?

  When I glimpsed the water far below, my throat tightened. My legs trembled. It would be bad enough to be forced out onto the ground rushing beneath. Into deep water rushing out to sea? I wouldn’t have a chance.

  “They know I shot Justice,” Luthera said. “What a name, eh?”

  I opened my mouth to reply but shut it. Better to let her talk. The more time I could gain, the sooner Kevin would be here. I normally preferred to be self-reliant, to save myself. Right now? My baby and I would take all the help we could get.

  “My husband treated me like every other man in my life has,” she went on with downturned mouth. “Telling me what to do. Bullying me in the guise of acting as my protector. Going behind my back to talk with that foolish man about his foolish plan.”

  “Ned Bailey’s horseless carriages?”

  “Yes. It’s a ridiculous idea,” she spat. “Montgomery Carriage is mine to do with as I wish. Not my husband’s.”

  “I’m sorry thee hasn’t been treated well.” And I was. I was more sorry Kevin hadn’t gotten here yet.

  “My own father could teach a course in how to be a bully. Or could have. He’s dead now,” she crowed.

  “That sounds like a painful upbringing.” I thought she lessened the pressure on my neck a little. Maybe in her musings she’d forgotten her plan to push me into the river below. “Thy mother didn’t shield thee from his treatment?”

  “Mother? She was cowed and weak. And then she died giving birth to my baby brother. He died, too, and I became Father’s heir apparent. Up until last year he still tried to run roughshod over me. I wasn’t having it, Mrs. Dodge.”

  Had she killed her father, as well? It wouldn’t surprise me, not with what I now saw of her.

  Behind her, the door opened inch by inch. Kevin. I forced my gaze onto my attacker. I couldn’t let on to Luthera that my rescue had arrived. Except in the periphery I spied not a serge uniform but a woman’s bowler, decorated with a blue ribbon, atop still-blond hair.

  The good doctor—Mary Chatigny—held a finger to her lips.

  I mustered a response to Luthera. “Thee was right and brave to stand up to thy father.”

  Mary let the door slide shut. If it clicked, the noise of the wheels on the tracks concealed the sound.

  “Of course I was.” Luthera pulled the gun away from my neck and gestured her righteousness.

  That was all Mary and I needed. From behind, Mary grabbed the wrist of Luthera’s gun-holding hand and held tight. I raised my fist and socked the Canadian in the nose. She cried out, crumpling to the floor even as Mary twisted her forearm up
. The gun fired into the open air beyond as it clattered down. It kept going through a gap in the plates, on to the river below.

  “Nice work, Doctor,” I said to Mary before sucking on my bruised, bloody knuckles. I’d never hit anyone before. Violence was counter to all the teachings of Friends. I thought God might forgive me, just this once, in the interests of preventing further violent acts.

  “Nice work, Midwife.” Mary grinned at me even as she kept her iron grip on the whimpering Luthera’s wrist.

  Our captive took the opportunity to kick out at my ankle. I stepped back in the nick of time.

  Kevin pulled open the door behind Mary. “Miss Rose, I—” He stopped abruptly, taking in the scene.

  The nature of the clatter changed as we exited the bridge and returned to tracks laid over dry land. From the first car, the conductor called out, “Next stop, Newburyport. Newburyport, next stop.” He pulled open the door behind me. A gasp was all I heard.

  “Mrs. Dodge and I have things under control, gentlemen.” Mary stared pointedly at the slender wrist in her grip. “Chief Donovan, care to take over here?”

  Chapter Forty-three

  Kevin gripped the elbow of a handcuffed Luthera. We three alit at the Newburyport train depot, the first to descend as we were already between cars. I’d thanked Mary heartily and wished her a peaceful conference before stepping down with the help of the conductor. The doctor would continue on this train south. Blessedly the rain had ceased, but a stiff wind had blown it out to sea, and I shivered.

  Rather than snarl and fight, Luthera had gone as icy as her eyes. “I demand to speak with the Canadian consulate in Boston.” Her face was streaked with dried blood from the wound I’d inflicted, but it hadn’t affected her pride.

  “We’ll put through the call, ma’am, but it won’t be ’til tomorrow,” Kevin said with a touch of satisfaction in his voice. “Today’s the Lord’s day of rest, you know. You’ll be comfortable in the Amesbury clink, I’m sure.”

  I very much doubted it. She lifted her chin and looked away. Passengers climbing down stared at us, widened their eyes, and hurried away. A worried-looking railroad man rushed up. He glanced at Luthera’s hands secured behind her back and returned a concerned gaze to Kevin.

  “Call the Amesbury police station, my man,” Kevin directed. “Tell them Chief Donovan needs the wagon here with all due dispatch, plus the matron.”

  “Yes, sir.” The man hurried off.

  Their only female officer would have to watch Luthera until she could be dispatched to the county lockup in Middleton. I wanted to call Faith, too, as soon as I arrived home. She would need to hurry to write her exclusive story.

  “Do you have anything to say for yourself, Mrs. Harrington?” Kevin asked.

  Luthera kept her gaze fixed on the roof of the depot and her mouth firmly shut.

  I wanted to tell Kevin what she’d said about her husband and her father maltreating her. And give him a word about checking into how her father died. But I couldn’t very well do so with her elbow in his grasp. Tomorrow would suffice.

  “What will happen to Ned?” I asked Kevin in a soft voice, not caring if Luthera heard. I rubbed my bruised fist. Helping to stop her had been worth even more bruises than this one.

  He let out a long breath. “The idiot obstructed justice. I’d like to see him serve a bit of time for it. But with the name of his family behind him, I doubt he’ll be charged with much more than a hand slap.”

  I thought through the others he—and I—had suspected. Zeb was in the clear, as I knew he would be. William had done nothing wrong in the end. Prudence had come forward with her information.

  “What about Jorge?” I asked. “He stole plans off a dead man.”

  “He’ll probably not see much time, either, although he needs to return those papers to Mr. Bailey.”

  “Good.” Would motor-powered carriages be in our near future? They would if Ned had anything to do with it.

  The whistle of the northbound train from Boston split the air, and again, growing closer. The clack of wheels grew louder. A conductor holding a flag strolled to the front of the platform, ready to signal the engineer driving the train.

  Luthera tore out of Kevin’s grasp and ran for the edge of the platform.

  “Stop that woman!” he cried as he dashed after her.

  Perhaps Kevin had loosened his grip. Maybe I had overly distracted him, or he’d thought Luthera would remain compliant. I watched, aghast, as she paused for a second at the verge, preparing to leap onto the tracks at the last moment, when it would be too late for the engine to stop.

  The conductor whirled. He whacked her back away from the edge with his flag. With her hands secured behind her back, her balance was off. She cried out and fell onto her back on the rough boards of the platform. The conductor stepped near her, the stick of the signaling device raised like a weapon. She tried to scoot nearer the edge to no avail, her mobility hampered as it was.

  Kevin arrived, breathing heavily, his police weapon now drawn and pointed at her. “Don’t you dare make a move, Mrs. Harrington.”

  Her nostrils widened as she glared, but she obeyed, not even moving her lips to speak.

  “Thank you, sir,” Kevin told the conductor.

  “Can’t have ladies leaping to their death,” the conductor acknowledged. “Not on my watch, we can’t.”

  The train huffed to a stop at the same time as the Amesbury police wagon pulled up. The matron climbed down from it.

  “If you’ll excuse me?” the conductor asked.

  “As you were.” Kevin’s voice was gruff with chagrin. He yanked Luthera to her feet and marched her to the back of the wagon. After she was secured inside and in the custody of the matron, he put away his weapon and turned to me. “I’m sorry you had to go through any of this, Miss Rose.”

  I touched his arm. “All’s well that ends well, Kevin. Right?”

  “I suppose.”

  Bertie rode up on Grover. “Have we had some excitement here, Rosetta?” She grinned, pointing at the wagon after staring at my bloodied hand.

  “After a fashion.” I smiled up at her. “Luthera tried to shoot me on the train.”

  “Ooh. She’s the murderer, is she?”

  “Apparently. But Mary Chatigny and I managed to outsmart her.”

  “And the ladies save the day once again,” Bertie said. “I like that. Do you know what Annie Oakley said? ‘When a man hits a target, they call him a marksman. When I hit a target, they call it a trick. Never did like that much.’” She raised an eyebrow. “I guess Mrs. Harrington shooting her husband to death wasn’t any trick.”

  “No, it wasn’t.” I stared at the wagon. “And she might have killed her own father, too.”

  Kevin snapped his head to look at me. I only nodded.

  “Good afternoon, Detective,” Bertie said. “Or, more rightly, Chief.”

  “Miss Winslow.”

  “I’m just back from a jaunt. How about a ride home?” she asked me. “Grover’s as happy to carry two lovely ladies as one.”

  “In your condition?” Kevin frowned at me, then glanced at the wagon. “Wouldn’t you rather sit in the front with the driver and me?”

  “I’m pregnant, Kevin, not ill.”

  Kevin cast his eyes skyward. He knew me too well to question such an apparently odd notion.

  I laughed. “Thank thee, but no. I’ll travel back with Bertie.” My friends had been turning up at all the right moments this week, for which I was grateful.

  “Good.” Bertie directed Grover over to a mounting block and slid off. “I think Rose and I have some catching up to do.”

  “Pay me a visit tomorrow,” Kevin said. “We’ll go over any unsolved bits, shall we?”

  “I shall.” I smiled at my partner in crime, so to speak. “Although it seems things are pretty well solved.”

  “I expect so,” he acknowledged. “Thank you, Miss Rose, for your . . . well, for everything.”

  I waved goodb
ye as he climbed into the front of the wagon. Turning to Bertie, I said, “I think it might be prudent for me to ride sidesaddle for once.”

  Epilogue

  David nestled atop the bed’s quilt next to Hattie and me on this early Seventh Month afternoon. Our baby daughter, only five hours old, slept cradled in my arm. Her dark hair was finer than silk and as soft as a breeze. David stroked her cheek.

  “Welcome to the world, Harriet Orpha Dodge,” he murmured.

  “Isn’t she perfect?” We’d named her for my late sister, and for my late mentor. I looked forward to sharing stories about both women with Hattie as she grew. They’d been two of the most important people in my life.

  “She’s as perfect as her mother,” David murmured. “You were a champion, Rosie.”

  I smiled at him. Annie had left only an hour earlier after cleaning up and making sure the baby and I were well and settled. Hattie had had a good first suckling, too.

  “I was lucky. My body did what it was built to do.” My pains had started in the wee hours of the morning, as so many do, but, unlike with many first-time mothers, it wasn’t a prolonged labor. Orpha’s deathbed prediction had blessedly come to pass. Hattie had entered the world at eleven fifteen this morning, with her father at my side. “Thee didn’t mind I wanted thee with me?”

  “I wouldn’t have had it any other way. I know it makes me odd among those of my sex. But you and I, Rose, we made this little girl together. I wanted to be with you when we greeted her. It’s not like I’ve never seen a baby be born.”

  “No, it isn’t.” I laughed softly. “Husband, dear, I remark that thy headaches seem to have vanished. I am glad.”

  “Yes, they have. I think I was worrying too much. About you, about the pregnancy. And, to be honest, about you being in danger. I didn’t want to keep you from your need to see justice done, but I was concerned.”

  “Rightfully so.”

  Faith popped her head in. “Can I bring tea, water, anything?” She had come to relieve Annie and to meet her new niece.