The White City

by Grace Hitchcock

  “Have no fear. I’ll take care of you,” she reassured him, admiring his clean jawline and full lips, devoid of that horrid mustache that almost every man in Chicago deemed a necessary part of their attire. Why they tried to hide their faces under a furry caterpillar, she’d never know, but of course, not all men could be as handsome as her escort. Stop it. He is paid to protect you. Nothing more. You best remember that before you allow your heart to be broken.

  “What? Is my tie crooked?” Jude tucked his chin down in an attempt to check for himself.

  Winnifred laughed and tugged off her gloves before reaching out to straighten it. The carriage wheel struck a rut in the road, jostling her into him, her hands inadvertently wrapping about his collar. She gazed up into his eyes and forgot to remove her hands for a few fleeting moments as the carriage rolled to a stop.

  “Can’t get any closer, sir,” the cabby called, wrenching them both out of the moment. “The place is packed. I could try to wade through, but you would be late for the opening. My suggestion is shank’s pony.”

  She jerked back, and Jude opened the door for them, assisting her out onto the sidewalk two blocks from the theatre. They walked in silence, her heart racing over what had just occurred. Dear Lord, let me not have frightened him off by my imprudence. Why did I linger? Why did I not pull away instantly?

  Jude handed their tickets to an usher, who bowed and motioned them to follow him as he expertly wove through the crowd to their seats. Any inhibitions she harbored melted away at the sight of the opulent theatre. The room hummed with excitement as the instruments performed their scales, warming up for the performance.

  “I have to admit that I feel almost guilty for enjoying this when I know that every minute I spend not studying Holmes’s case is another minute a criminal is going free and possibly plotting something dire,” she confessed. A man jostled her shoulder and Jude drew his arm about her waist, tucking her to him until the press of people lessened.

  His hand found the small of her back as he gently guided her through the curtain to their seats beyond. Thanking the usher, Jude handed him a folded bill and held the back of her chair. “I know how you feel, but I learned long ago that in order to survive this job and to continue helping people, you need to learn how to take a break from the hardness of life and savor the sweet moments.”

  Savor the sweet moments? Like this one? Her breath caught as she met his steady gaze, thankful he could not read her thoughts as she sank into the red velvet cushion.

  Jude released his hold on the back of her chair and, leaning forward, whispered into her ear. “Let’s forget Holmes for tonight.”

  She bowed her head, trying to cool her cheeks with her silk fan as the orchestra finished warming up, their sweet trills and low notes that had been filling the air only seconds before silencing as the famous maestro, Theodore Thomas, tapped his baton against his music stand. The arched ceilings magnified the melody, the music pulsating through her body and clearing her mind of all but the music.

  Feeling someone watching her, she looked across the theatre to see acquaintances of Percy’s in the other boxes, staring at her. She smiled and nodded to them, but instead of a warm return, they awarded her with barely veiled disdain as they turned away. She gripped her fan in her fist. What snobs. While attending the symphony in Percy’s box with another man may look odd to them, she was too excited about being so close to the stage to give up the chance to experience it. She lifted her head and turned her attention back to the music.

  That notebook and scribbling pencil had finally become his friend. Percy was a fool for missing out on an evening with Miss Wylde. Sitting slightly behind her left side, Jude was free to observe her without fear of her noticing as the music carried her into another land. She always seemed so strong and confident, but he loved seeing the gentleness unfold in her countenance tonight. Again and again he’d heard from older officers how she was exactly like her mother in looks and spirit, but more often than not, he saw her father in her actions. Tonight, he saw what the others were talking about.

  Officer Baxter had recounted the tragic story of how Mrs. Wylde passed away, and he couldn’t imagine, after being in the presence of such a winsome, playful spirit full of joy, how Inspector Wylde bore such a loss. It was little wonder to him that the inspector wished for his daughter to always be protected.

  At intermission, Winnifred turned to him with shining eyes. “Wasn’t that marvelous? I felt like I was on stage myself, we were so close.”

  “I doubt I’ll ever be able to watch the symphony in general admissions now.” He gave her a smile, refraining from winking at her should others catch him.

  She rolled her eyes. “I know you are teasing, but I have to admit I also had the thought that the symphony will never quite be the same again.” She extended her hand to him. “I’m a bit parched. Shall we adjourn to the refreshment hall?”

  He rose and slipped her hand into the crook of his arm before guiding her out into the crowded hall, keeping her as near as he could to avoid her being jostled by a passerby again.

  “I may need to stop by the powder room to freshen up,” she whispered to him.

  “Of course,” he said, moving toward the requested room. “I’ll fetch the drinks, or shall I wait for you?”

  She gave him a smile. “I doubt that I will be accosted by any women in the powder room, Detective Thorpe, but if I am, I’ll be sure to use the maneuvers Father taught me as a young girl to defend myself against marauders.”

  He laughed, but he had to concur that the lady’s powder room should be no cause for alarm, when he spied Mr. Saunders with a woman.

  Winnifred, having seen her old suitor as well, paused in their promenade and offered the couple a bright smile. The woman looked at Winnifred with her right brow angled before she turned up her nose and, without a word to Winnifred, turned her attention back to Mr. Saunders and whispered loud enough for them to hear as they approached, “That is the woman you recently courted? It’s only Winnifred Wylde, and I’d say she’s hardly pretty enough for all the trouble she caused you.”

  His gaze on Winnifred, Saunders moved toward them, causing the lady to fairly hiss. Saunders nodded to Jude before addressing Winnifred. “Detective Thorpe is still by your side, I see.”

  “Yes, Father wishes for me to be protected.” She smiled at the woman. “And how are you this fine—”

  “I’m sorry, we don’t have much time before intermission concludes. If you’ll excuse us, I have some important people to introduce my fiancée to,” Mr. Saunders interrupted, his mustache dipping below his chin.

  “You’re engaged? Congrat—” She stopped talking, as he was already moving away. Winnifred’s face reddened, and she flicked open her fan and disappeared into the powder room.

  Jude bristled, finding it odd that they would be so rude to her. Was it because of him? Or was it because of the woman’s jealousy over Winnifred’s beauty? Concealing his concern for Winnifred, he secured two glasses of punch and waited a discreet distance from the powder room. When she finally appeared, he searched her face for any sign of distress, but as her gaze found his in the crowd, he read nothing but pleasure.

  She took the cup and, with a whispered thanks, downed it. “I’ve come to expect that treatment from others, but I never would have thought that she, of all people, would turn on me like this.”

  “You know the woman? Then why would she—?”

  “Slight me? With a marriage to Mr. Saunders, Nellie will rise quite a bit above her current station. In fact, one could technically say I was above Nellie on society’s ladder, but now that she is engaged to a Saunders, she has eclipsed me and finds herself far too good for me or anyone else who is below her now.”

  “What a lonely way to live.” Jude set aside their empty glasses and took her arm, longing to embrace her.

  She shrugged as if it mattered little to her. “It’s one of the reasons why Aunt Lillian wishes me to marry well and quickly. She is afraid that i
f I wait too long, my friends—no, my acquaintances—will move on with their lives and leave me behind. And then, by the time I do marry, they will have forgotten about me and I will never receive an invitation to anywhere else in my life, unless I marry very well at that point. But what Aunt Lillian fails to see is that I do not wish for such fair-weather friends.” She leaned her head on his arm for a half second before catching herself. “Come, intermission is almost over. We had better find our—” She gasped and yanked him into the shadows of a potted plant, pressing his shoulder down with her palm and keeping her arm over his shoulder as if afraid to move.

  Jude, his senses instantly awakened, twisted in the direction of her wide-eyed gaze. Holmes was at the refreshment bar merely yards away with a woman draped on his arm.

  “He can’t see me here. Not dressed like this.” She whispered up to him, her chin nearly in his chest in the close quarters behind the foliage.

  He lifted a finger to his lips and crouched even farther down beside her, watching through the leaves. The woman, though well-dressed, did not have the attire of one from the box seats, but that of general admission, the seating for which was in the opposite direction. He and Winnifred would be safe if they waited until the couple was out of sight.

  “You hardly have time for us anymore. I’d wager that Lucy would not even recognize you.” The woman’s voice choked.

  “Darling, I’m sure you are exaggerating. You know that business keeps me quite busy.” Holmes drew his arm over her shoulders, producing a handkerchief from his breast pocket and pressing it into her hand as he kissed her cheek.

  “Too busy even for us?”

  He rested a hand on her elbow. “Let’s not argue on our anniversary, my sweet. Come, the orchestra is about to begin again, and I know how you love the next piece.” Giving her a gentle smile, he escorted her away.

  Winnifred turned to Jude, their faces an inch apart. “Holmes is seeing someone? No one has mentioned his calling on anyone. And an anniversary? They’ve obviously been seeing one another for quite some time then.”

  “Maybe no one knows.” He shook his head against the scent of her delicate perfume filling his senses, trying to grasp what this meant. Hearing the music, he held out his hand. “Do you want to go back in?”

  She grasped his hand, and he could feel her tremble. “I would be much too afraid that he would spot me in my box. I pray that he did not already.”

  “But would he even recognize you?” He gazed at her embroidered gown with its yards of lace and pearls accentuating the delicate neckline, dipping gracefully to expose her creamy skin. “You are dressed far differently than your stern navy suit and with your hair arranged so, you look like a socialite tonight, not a secretary.”

  She exhaled and gripped his arm. “I pray you are right.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  “If I had a flower for every time I thought of you …

  I could walk through my garden forever.”

  ~Lord Alfred Tennyson

  Winnifred stretched under her feather-filled duvet, smiling softly to herself as memories of the sweetness of last night flooded over her. After Jude had returned her safely home, she’d dreamt of him professing his love to her and of her kissing him with a consuming longing. The thought of their kiss, fictional though it may have been, brought a blush to her cheeks. It was at times like these that she ached for Danielle to hurry home from her honeymoon, but she knew Danielle’s husband still had a business trip following and it would be months before they returned and Winnifred could share her heart’s yearnings.

  The clock over the carved mantel chimed, reminding her to begin her preparations for the day. Rolling out of bed, she reached for her toothpowder, thinking of Jude’s smile. She brushed her hair, all the while remembering his kindness toward her last night. Selecting her gray suit with the cream lace trim, she recalled how Jude’s eyes sparked when he saw her in her sapphire damask last night.

  At the chime of the clock yet again, Winnifred realized she was far too late for breakfast. She would have to go to work on an empty stomach and, as if on cue, her stomach rumbled in protest. She patted her corset. She never liked to be hungry. Snapping her fingers, she rummaged through her drawers and found one last piece of chocolate left over from the box Saunders had brought her. Popping the formerly rejected orange-flavored sweet into her mouth, she hurried down the stairs, taking the steps two at a time, eager to see Jude.

  Since she had begun working at the Englewood house, her father had increased Jude’s days of watching her to six, taking away all his other duties so he could focus on her. She couldn’t help her smile as she pinned on her plain navy hat, knowing that he would be waiting for her. She stepped out into the warm summer morning and looked about expectantly for him, but instead found Officer Baxter at the bottom of her steps, hat in hand as he leaned his hip against the gate, waiting.

  “Officer Baxter! What are you doing here? What happened to Jude? I mean, Detective Thorpe?” Her body tensed. Nothing could keep him away … nothing except a tragedy or her father.

  “He came down with a cold this morning and was unable to make his shift.” He grinned. “I was at the station when he sent word through one of the officers who lives in the same building, and your father assigned me to your case in Thorpe’s stead. Winnifred Wylde, I cannot believe you got your father to agree to this.” He chuckled, slapping his hat against his thigh. “Here the boys and I’ve been thinking that Thorpe was being assigned to a highly classified case, and now I come to find out that instead of thwarting criminals, he’s been gallivanting around the fair with the prettiest girl in Chicago, the lucky rascal.”

  Her stomach knotted. No ordinary cold would keep Jude from his post. “Did he say how he was feeling?”

  “It had to have been bad enough to keep him from you. Must be a weakling under all that muscle after all.” He rolled his shoulders back and sniffed. “It would take more than a cold to keep me from a post like this.”

  Winnifred was too worried to reply to his ridiculous statement. Dear Lord, let Jude not be too ill, she prayed as memories of her mother’s sudden death flooded her being. She gripped the iron gate to steady herself.

  “Now, don’t you go getting upset and ruining your morning,” Baxter said, taking her by the elbow, concern shining in his eyes. “I’m sure it really is only a cold. Even the most robust of us have to get a little sick sometime. It’s only fair.”

  She gave him a half smile and gathered her wits.

  He extended his arm to her. “Does Thorpe get to escort you on his arm?”

  She sighed, shying away from him, knowing he was a hopeless flirt. “Only on rare occasions. Most of the time he trails behind, keeping an eye on me.”

  He sighed, feigning colossal disappointment. “Can’t this be one of those occasions?”

  She smothered her laughter and kept her hands folded demurely around her dangling reticule. “I’m afraid not, Officer Baxter.”

  He shrugged and fell into step beside her. “I can’t wait to tell the others that while we’ve been working, he’s been out of the office day after perfect day like this one and in the company of an angel.”

  Winnifred attempted to make coherent replies to his constant chatter, but all the way to work, her thoughts were with Jude, and all through work she thought of him, imagining him home alone and writhing in pain from a fever. Most likely his mother and sister are looking after him, Winnifred told herself, trying to reassure herself that he wasn’t in any danger. Fear flickered through her at the thought that Holmes had poisoned him. She shook her head. “That is ridiculous,” she muttered under her breath.

  Joe Owens looked up from Holmes’s rolltop desk in the adjoining room. “Did you say something?”

  “Sorry. Talking to myself,” she called. She pressed her lips together and set to work typing up her notes from her uneventful meeting with Holmes and a supplier the other morning. The typewriter was harder to master than she’d anticipated, and her pag
e was constantly getting marred with little mistakes that caused her to have to stop and retype the whole sheet.

  The only thing she’d found strange about her job so far was that Holmes had ordered more supplies but had used her name on the form. When she had asked him about it, he’d said that should she need to sign for the delivery on Friday when he was out of town, it would be easier to have the name matching that on the order.

  Hovering over the ledger, studying the items coming in and the very few payments going out, Winnifred laced her hands and tapped her thumbs together, counting the minutes until her half day would come to a close and she could discover how Jude was doing for herself.

  “Something on your mind today, miss?” Joe asked as he came with a fresh pile of papers for her to sort.

  She tapped the ledger. “I’m seeing a lot of building materials coming in, but few payments being made to the suppliers. Am I missing some documentation?”

  “Mr. Holmes likes to keep that private and won’t even allow me to see, but I’ll ask him for you,” Joe replied as the grandfather clock chimed downstairs, its bell sounding through the floorboards. “Well, I guess that’s it for you today, Miss Swan. See you tomorrow.” He nodded to her and returned to his own stack of papers.

  “I can go over those tomorrow if you’d like, Mr. Owens,” she offered casually as she slipped her hatpin into place.

  “I would take you up on it, but Mr. Holmes was extremely clear that you were only to manage the mail that was already sifted through by him or on occasion by me. And as slow as you type”—he chuckled—“you have your hands full. Better get faster before Mr. Holmes finds out how long it’s been taking you.”

  “Hilarious.” She waved to him, bidding him farewell. Stepping outside, she determined to call on Jude to set her mind at ease. He had seemed perfectly well the night before. No cold could possibly set in that quickly and take him away from his post. She tugged on her gloves and formulated her plan to take the grip car, stop at the café near his house, and pick up some soup and pie and bring it to him as a valid excuse to see him.