by Jo Schaffer
“Oh …” Hazel thought about that. “Did they ever look back at you with hatred?”
“Sure. Some. I’ve had my share of harassers.”
“Sounds like people need to learn how to treat each other better. It’s easy to find fault wherever you look for it. And sometimes …” She thought of Stanley and how different they were. “It’s easy to find the good too. If you don’t make assumptions, and you give people a chance.”
Sandy snorted. “The scales are not balanced, Hazel.”
“No. They aren’t. But if you do the same thing to other people that you hate them for—that makes no sense.”
“People need to get what they deserve,” she growled, the jagged scar down the side of her face wrinkling as she frowned.
“What would that look like … if we all got what we deserved? Does someone without work deserve a house and food? Do you deserve to be in prison for the stunt you pulled tonight? Think hard about that.”
“You’ve got this all wrong. Someone has to make it right.”
“Who’s qualified to decide how? You? You can somehow make everything fair for everyone by killing off a handful of people who might be guilty of being unfair themselves?”
Sandy’s eyes burned with rage. “Unfair? Unfair! They aren’t just unfair. They’re killers.”
“Like you and Arthur just tried to be.” The words fell heavy between them.
Sandy shook her head. “You don’t get it.”
“What I get … is that people are not groups. They’re people. Anyone who says everyone in a group is the same, is plain wrong.”
Sandy pointed at her, a sneer on her face. “You don’t know what it’s like to lose someone you love. You don’t know how painful it is every day.” Her voice shook, and fresh tears ran down her face. “Come back and judge me when you’ve lost someone.”
Hazel hated to see her friend in so much agony. Tears slid down her own cheeks now. She realized that Sandy’s pain needed something to blame and punish. Logic was not going to do anything. “I love you. I don’t want to lose you … and it feels like I am. I’m scared.”
Sandy’s face relaxed, and she dropped her accusing finger. “Hazel,” she whispered. “God help me …”
Mumsy’s voice sliced through the chugging of the automobiles and people leaving. “Girls! I’ve been losing my mind. You’re safe.” She scurried over in a swirl of satin and feathers, throwing her arms around Hazel and Sandy. “Let’s get out of here.”
Hazel’s parents sat and comforted her and talked out what had happened that night for over an hour. They were not sure what to do about Arthur and Stanley, but one thing was for sure, Hazel had to avoid any public association with them until they knew how the papers would spin it. There might not be a way to convince the Veiled Prophet that Hazel and Stanley’s connection ended with all of the publicity after the kidnapping, but they had to try.
It was past midnight, and the house had settled down. Under the bed covers, Hazel was fully dressed. She was determined to somehow make sure that Stanley was okay. Her father had said he’d seen him safe, but that Arthur was loose. Hazel thought about Sandy and wondered how to help her friend. It was a good thing that Stanley had shown up when he had to stop what Arthur was planning to do. In Hazel’s heart, she believed that Sandy would have been destroyed by guilt and regret.
She heard Peggy come into her room, so she closed her eyes and pretended sleep. The Irish maid approached the bed and laid a gentle hand on Hazel’s head.
“Father, protect this one,” she whispered. “Thank you for givin’ me a child to love all these years while my heart missed my own. Shield them both from evil … and please let us all be a family someday. Amen.”
Peggy stood there a few moments more before letting out a sigh and leaving the room. Hazel lay still, wondering about what she’d just heard. After a few minutes of waiting and listening to make sure that it was safe, Hazel slipped out of bed and pulled on her warmest coat.
Nobody noticed as she slipped out of the back of the house with Henri on a leash. He wagged his tail with excitement but obeyed her no-barking command.
The temperature had dropped, and there was frost on the lawn. The eerie silence that happens after a shock is the quietest kind of quiet. Hazel’s neighborhood was still, and many families left their yards lit up. As if they didn’t want to be taken by surprise by anything that may be hiding in the shadows of night. It felt as if everyone had vanished in the middle of an evening garden party.
She wrapped her fur coat tightly around her shoulders and held her chin high. Henri helped her feel brave, as she made her way down the sidewalk. A deep need to find Stanley had roused her from the safety of her bedroom. He’d been a hero again that night in front of everyone. But heroes were irrelevant. All some of them would remember about that night was that two ruffians trespassed into one of the most important and exclusive nights of the year.
Arthur had made it all worse. The Knights would become a target for Legion for certain. A line in the sand had been drawn, and all of St. Louis would have to choose a side. The problem was that the enemy was the one defining what the sides were. They had established the “us against them” rules without regard to personal choice or individuals. The divide was merely one of class and status. But in real life … the truth was never that simple.
The now familiar walk through Forest Park seemed longer in the dark, but Hazel charged forward, ignoring the night voices and the shadows that moved and, at times, followed her. Henri growled and barked at times as they went. Nobody approached her. Though her heart raced, Hazel didn’t feel afraid. She felt determined and eager to find her newsie safe and sound. Hazel’s gut told her Stanley was at the red boxcar. If not, it was a shortcut across Forest Park to Dogtown where he lived anyway.
The moon lit up the bare trees and filtered light onto the ground in gauzy patches. The hideout was close. Suddenly, Henri stopped and let out a whine. His ears perked up, and a low growl sounded in his throat.
“Anhalten,” Hazel commanded.
Henri obeyed with silence but continued to stare into the darkness in front of them. The hair on Hazel’s arms prickled. “What is it, boy?” she said in a low voice. She strained to hear footsteps or breathing, but there was only the faraway sounds of the people who huddled around fires for warmth. Hazel’s own breath came out in white clouds. She rubbed her hands together to warm them.
Tugging on the leash, Hazel continued forward in the direction of what the newsies called The Castle. In the thick of the trees, she saw the rectangular, leaning shape of the abandoned boxcar. Then she heard it: the soft tappity-tap-tap, like a distant tommy gun starting and stopping, starting and stopping.
It was coming from inside the hideout where a soft, yellow glow leaked from under the crooked sliding door. The closer she got, the more Hazel began to question the wisdom of coming here alone. She swallowed. “Stanley?”
The tapping stopped.
“Hello. Stanley are you in there?” She stood poised, ready to run.
“Haze?”
She sighed in relief to hear his familiar, deep voice.
The door slid open with a rusty scraping sound, and Stanley’s tall body was outlined by the soft candlelight coming from inside the boxcar. “How did you know I was here?” His voice shook.
She wanted to tell him that she felt it in her gut—like a homing beacon. But instead, she gave the logical answer. “I figured after your uncle let you go, you’d end up here,” Hazel said as Henri bounced and barked happily to see Stanley.
“You shouldn’t have put yourself in danger and come here.” Stanley sounded angry, then his firm tone cracked. “But thank God you did. You’re a sight for sore eyes.” His shoulders slumped, and he covered his face with his hands.
Was he crying? Hazel’s insides flipped. “Oh, Stanley. Baby.” She held up her hands for him.
He reached down and pulled her up inside the boxcar. Stanley
clung to her tightly with strong arms, breathing hard with emotion into her shoulder. She rubbed his back in a small circle as they pressed together that way until a warm peace encircled them.
“Heh. Sorry, Bananas. So much has happened.”
“I know.” She didn’t want him to be embarrassed about crying. Behind him, she saw a small, black typewriter on the table and several lit candles.
She pulled back. “So that’s what I was hearing. Thought maybe you had Fred and Ginger in here, tap dancing.”
Stanley smiled, grateful for the comic relief. He wiped his eyes and then ran a hand through his hair. “Sure. They just left.”
Hazel wrinkled her nose at him. “Thought so.”
Just looking at him this way made her heart squishy. He’d removed the jacket and bowtie from earlier that evening, his collar was open, and he wore suspenders. He’d finally shaved, from the looks of it.
Stanley was hers. No mistake about that.
Henri jumped up inside the boxcar and wound around Stanley’s legs until he bent to scratch the dog’s head. Stanley grinned, but his face was tired when he looked at Hazel. “I’m writing an article about the missing kids in town. I want people to start to notice and talk about the tattoos—tell them what it all means.”
“Well. There’s a war on now. Your articles, along with what happened tonight, are going to start a big stir.”
“I already have a target on my back, Hazel.”
“I don’t want anything to happen to you, Snoopy.” She shivered and briskly rubbed her arms.
“I know.” He reached out, held both of her hands, and led her to the old, sunken sofa at the back of the boxcar. They sat, holding hands without speaking. She could see that Stanley had his brain full of things he was thinking about.
Hazel watched how candlelight flickered on the angles of his face. His hands were strong and warm on hers. Unlike everything else in her world, he was so real and solid. Losing him was unimaginable. It made her heart squeeze to think of everything he’d been through lately, and that maybe this was only the beginning. How could she shield him while he was taking on the powers of darkness?
Stanley stared across the boxcar, lost in his mind. “When they got Vinnie, I knew none of us were safe. So I figured … if I’m going down, I gotta get the last word in. I know you don’t like it, but that’s why I’m writing.”
Hazel nodded. “I understand that. I just wish someone else would do it instead. Maybe the Veiled Prophet is grateful you saved him tonight … but this paper business won’t be ignored.”
She picked up one of his hands and pressed it to her cheek. “I am so sorry about Vinnie.”
“Thank you. I loved that mug.” Stanley blinked away tears.
“It hurts to lose someone … I think it destroyed Sandy to lose her sister. I feel like I’ve lost my best friend in a way too—she’s not who she was. But …” Hazel stifled a sudden sob. “If I lose you, I won’t be able to bear it.”
Stanley turned toward her, his face soft and vulnerable. “You’d miss me that much, Lady Bananas?”
She nodded, unable to speak.
He caressed her cheek, his blue eyes catching the candlelight as they searched her face.
“How’d I get so lucky? Sometimes I’m not sure if anyone really gives a crumb about what happens to me.”
“I do.”
“I won’t let them take me from you. I found you in the cave, didn’t I? Then I took your soul back from them. They can’t separate us. Ever.”
Hazel wrapped her arms around him, breathing in his scent. “But what if Charles is out? He could be loose, and we wouldn’t know. The police are dirty … Sandy and Arthur have lost their minds, nobody is who they seem to be.”
Stanley patted her back. “Slow down there. One thing at a time. If Charles is out, he won’t hide forever, and we’ll deal with it again. The police may be dirty, but not all of them. But who needs them? Father Timothy and the others have formed their own squad.”
“Still. The odds are overwhelming.”
“David against Goliath. I know.”
“What do we do about Bonnie and Clyde? I still can’t believe what they did tonight. I can’t make sense of it.”
“I’m not sure what to do.” Stanley frowned. “I thought I knew Artie better. Those two will have to be muzzled. Father Timothy and Seamus will deal with Artie—once they find him. But we have bigger things to face right now. There’s more …”
“More?” Hazel sat forward, eyes wide. “More than being up against all of the powerful elite in St. Louis?”
“The maid found in the trash heap. The papers said she was shot. But it turns out that wasn’t true. We have an informer who saw the original coroner’s report. She had internal bleeding … her baby maker was removed. Something went wrong, and she bled to death.”
“What?”
“We think she was forcibly sterilized. Seems there have been a lot of cases lately across the United States. Women claiming they were tricked into it or forced.”
“Controlled breeding,” Hazel said in disgust.
“They call it racial hygiene.”
“A pretty phrase for such an ugly thing.”
“The aggressive colonization of ideas always comes with a code language to sugarcoat things. It’s going on over in Germany too. ‘Life unworthy of life’ is being dealt with.”
“Stanley, that must be terrifying for poor folk.”
“Hazel … it’s terrifying for everyone. It means at any time somebody can decide your group is next. See? Now, it might be the poor, feeble, or a certain race. But one day it might be … people with blue eyes and curly hair.” He touched one of her curls. “Then it’s people who go to church, or don’t go to church. People who like their eggs sunny side up, people who own dogs, and people who like Cole Porter … Get what I’m saying?”
“Yes. I do, and you’re right. I tried to tell Sandy a similar thing. She sees all rich people as a group who are the same—even while being a rich person who is quite different. It makes no true sense.”
“It’s madness.”
“Oh, Stanley. Everyone is whacky. Who is there even left to trust?”
“Me. You. Your dad and Father Timothy … A handful of ratty Knights. I’m sure there’s more. The trustworthy ones are usually silent. They do things, not just spew rhetoric meant to control thoughts.”
Hazel nodded in agreement. One of the things that she loved about Stanley was that he was a thinker, and his life hadn’t stopped him from searching for truth and learning. The other Knights joked and called him professor sometimes, but they admired him too.
“You can trust Peggy, Haze. She’s fighting in this too … maybe that’s why it’s in my blood.”
Hazel made a face. “Fighting Irish?”
“More personal than that … You’re right, it’s hard to trust when everyone is lying or crazy. Seamus has been lying to me for years about my parents …” He gave her a long look, as if waiting for her to catch up.
“In your blood …” Then she saw it. The hair, something about the shape of the eyes, and the quickness of the smile. “Peggy …”
Stanley nodded with a look as if he barely believed it himself. “Yeah. Turns out, I’m not an orphan. Peggy is my mom.”
Hazel let out a gasp, her heart beating with surprise and joy. “Stanley.”
“She and my dad belonged to an order that has fought Legion all along. The Veiled Prophet is just another manifestation of Legion’s dark work. They killed my dad, and Peggy—my mom—was locked up in the loony bin for years. After she got out, it was safer for both of us to let Seamus raise me.” He reached into his shirt and pulled out his St. Jude necklace. “She has one just like it,” he said.
Hazel was speechless as her mind raced through outrage that Stanley had lost out on a lifetime of having a mother, to elation because Peggy and Stanley were her two favorite people in the world. It was so clear now how
alike they were.
“Stanley … this is amazing. I thought maybe she had a child who died. But you … you’re her son.” Hazel could not decide what to say or think of it all.
“Yeah.” Stanley nodded and quickly wiped his eyes. “I’ve got some mixed feelings, that’s sure. I understand why she did it, but she was right there all along, and I grew up without her.” His voice sounded strained.
“And I was practically raised by the mother you never got to have.”
They sat together in their own thoughts. It was strange how their lives had been woven together long before they had ever met. Before ever knowing Stanley, she’d see him sometimes on the sidewalk selling papers as she drove by. There was a connection there even then. It seemed to Hazel that fate had led her to the Hi-Point movie theater to see that baseball picture last fall. Because Stanley and she were always destined to meet … and then what? Fight darkness together? He from the outside and her from the inside? Or was this about love?
“This doesn’t make you my sister, by the way,” Stanley joked, breaking the silence.
Hazel laughed. Everything was so heavy, she’d take any excuse. “Then kiss me, and let’s forget all of this for a minute.”
“Gladly.” Stanley’s smile sent a thrill through her. He pulled her into his arms, and they kissed on the sunken sofa in the abandoned boxcar as if it was Paris in the rain.
Some minutes later, Hazel leaned against Stanley on the couch, wrapped in his arms. “Stanley,” Hazel whispered. “How can I help? I mean … trying to find out who the Veiled Prophet is isn’t simple. Especially if he keeps changing. I think knowing who he is, is less valuable than knowing how they are organizing The Winnowing and how to stop it.”
“Do you think you could find proof that the papers lied about Maxie’s death?”
Hazel thought, tracing her fingers down Stanley’s arms. “I sometimes file things for the doctor. There might be something in there about her last visit. She’d come in complaining about her stomach.”