Yesterday's Roses

by Heather Cullman

  Ariel stared up at her aunt with surprise, her shrieks momentarily reduced to a mewling whimper. Growling again, Penelope swooped down and covered the baby’s small face with kisses, not stopping until her sounds of distress had dissolved into chortles of delight.

  “If only the proper Princess P’s beaux could see her now,” chuckled Jake, pausing just beneath the arched opening of the garden to stare at his sister.

  It was hard to believe that this charming hoyden, her hair tumbling down her back and her white muslin gown grass-stained from playing with his daughter, was the same waspish girl of just four months ago. Yet Penelope seemed truly happy these days, something she hadn’t been since their parents had died. Her happiness, like his own, had blossomed in the sunshine of Hallie’s caring presence.

  At the sound of her father’s voice, Ariel held out her arms, squealing her delight. It was obvious that she adored her father, a feeling which was returned tenfold. Hallie smiled as Jake strode over to the baby. She couldn’t recall the last time she had seen a man as crazy about an infant as Jake was about his daughter.

  Sweeping Ariel up into his arms, Jake tossed her in the air, quipping, “What have we here?” Catching her tiny form easily, he held the baby high above his head, peering into her smiling face with mock suspicion. “Why, I do believe I’ve captured myself a garden sprite!”

  With that, Jake swung her around in the air like a flying fairy, eliciting screams of laughter from Ariel. It was one of their favorite games, and neither ever tired of it.

  Finally settling the infant in the crook of his arm, he declared, “Everyone knows that to give a fairy sugar is to ensure good luck for the whole year.” He fumbled in his pocket and produced a stick of molasses candy.

  “Jake!” Hallie protested, as he stuck the treat into the baby’s mouth. “You’re going to ruin her teeth giving her sweets.”

  “All three of them,” Penelope added with a giggle, holding up her arms to take Ariel from her brother.

  Grinning wickedly, Jake turned to his wife and planted a kiss on her lips. “Jealous, are you?” he teased, enjoying the way Hallie was frowning at his battered face. He’d just returned from boxing with Seth and was looking forward to having his wife fuss over his scrapes. Invariably, her innocent examinations turned into the intimate ones he so enjoyed.

  “Never fear.” He laughed. “I’ve got molasses sticks for all my girls.” He playfully shoved a candy stick in Hallie’s mouth and then bent low to do the same to his sister.

  “You’re in a happy mood,” Penelope observed, daintily licking at her treat. “Considering that your eye and cheek are starting to swell and you’ve got a nasty cut on your lower lip.”

  With a raucous whoop, Jake lifted Hallie into the air, sending her candy stick tumbling from her mouth. “That’s because I won the boxing match!” Twirling her around, he shouted, “I pummeled Seth from one end of the ring to the other!”

  “Poor Seth!” Hallie laughed. Wrapping her arms around Jake’s neck, she gave him a gentle kiss, careful not to hurt his torn lip. This was the first time since her husband had been wounded that he’d been able to best Seth in the ring. It was, indeed, a victory to be savored.

  “And what would the champion like for a prize?” she whispered, staring into his sparkling green eyes.

  Jake arched one dark eyebrow as he returned her gaze. “Perhaps an examination would be in order?” he purred, his meaning abundantly clear.

  “For you or for Seth?” Hallie giggled. “It sounds as if you left poor Seth in dire need of medical care.”

  “Seth can find his own lady doctor,” Jake growled, nipping suggestively at her earlobe. “Mine is going to be occupied for the rest of the afternoon.”

  Penelope cleared her throat, coyly reminding the pair of her presence. Jake and Hallie were always touching and kissing, and though it warmed her heart to see the two people she loved most so happy, she sometimes found their behavior a bit embarrassing.

  “Jake!” Penelope admonished, shaking a finger at her grinning brother. “Hallie wanted to tell me something important.”

  “Oh, yes! I was going to … Jake!” Hallie squealed, pushing her husband’s roving hands away from her waist. “Behave yourself! I need to tell Penelope about my morning call.”

  Jake groaned. “Appetizing thought! Did you do some particularly fancy suturing? Or did you cut into some poor wretch’s body?”

  “Neither.” Hallie laughed and gave her husband’s backside a playful swat. He jumped and let out an exaggerated yelp, pretending he’d been gravely wounded by her blow.

  Hallie smiled at his lighthearted antics before turning her attention back to Penelope. “Madame de Sonennes tripped over a sandbag while she was rehearsing for this evening’s performance. She hurt her ankle, and in order to preserve her modesty, the theater owner contacted me to tend her.”

  “Madeleine de Sonennes? The singer?” Penelope choked. The world-famous Madame de Sonennes was in San Francisco to perform in a musical production titled Gold Rush Nell. Penelope practically worshiped the singer and had already been to see the operetta twice.

  “The very same,” Hallie replied, grinning at the girl’s moonstruck expression. “She told me that the girl singing the ingénue’s part is leaving the company to get married and they’re frantic to find a replacement. I suggested you.”

  Penelope’s mouth dropped open. “M-Me?”

  “Yes. You. She’ll hear you sing tomorrow if you’re interested. And if she likes you, which I’m sure she will, she’ll train you for the role herself.”

  “Interested!” Penelope screamed, hurling herself into Hallie’s arms to give her a hug. “Of course I’m interested! Oh, Hallie! I do love you! Did you hear that, Jake?”

  “I couldn’t help but hear,” Jake chuckled, jokingly rubbing his ears as if Penelope’s shrieks had impaired his hearing. Giving his sister an affectionate squeeze, he murmured, “I’ll look forward to bragging about my sister, the famous singer.”

  Suddenly everyone was talking at once, making plans for Penelope’s future and speculating on the scope of her coming fame. Even Ariel got into the act, chortling and waving her chubby fists in the air.

  “Mister Jake! Mister Jake!” Hop Yung came tearing around the corner at breakneck speed. “Lawmen here—pant—say they take Mister Jake to jail.” He skidded to a stop in front of his employer, his chest heaving from exertion.

  “What the hell?” Jake expelled, shaking his head at Hallie’s questioning stare.

  Struggling to catch his breath, Hop merely nodded.

  “Darling?”

  “Don’t worry,” Jake murmured, tenderly stroking his wife’s cheek. “It’s got to be some sort of mistake.” Turning back to Hop, he demanded, “Where are the police now?”

  Breathlessly, Hop pointed behind him, just as four policemen poured through the small garden gate.

  “Mr. Parrish?” snapped a middle-aged officer with steel gray hair and paunchy midsection. “We’re here to arrest you for the murder of Arabella Dunlap.”

  Hallie gasped with shock, while Penelope stared at Jake, dumbfounded. Hop Yung, who had snatched up the now squalling Ariel, scowled at the policemen belligerently.

  “On what basis?” Jake asked, taking Hallie’s cold hand in his and giving it a reassuring squeeze.

  “You were seen leaving Mrs. Dunlap’s house this morning shortly before she was discovered dead. She’d been beaten and strangled. She was buck naked except for one red glove.” The policeman gave a short laugh. “But you already know the details. By the looks of your face, she must’ve put up quite a fight.”

  “Ridiculous!” snorted Penelope, hovering protectively by her brother’s side.

  Jake stared at the man through narrowed eyes. “And just who are my accusers?”

  The officer took out his tablet and shuffled through the pages. �
�You were seen by two witnesses. A Mr. Cyrus King and a Mrs. Lavinia Donahue. The latter claims that you were a frequent—ahem—visitor of the Widow Dunlap.”

  “I was at Arabella’s this morning,” Jake confessed, aching as Hallie pulled her hand from his and moved away, staring at him with a wounded expression. He took a step toward her, “Hallie—”

  “Aha!” interjected the policeman, signaling for his companions to surround their suspect. “So you confess?”

  Jake forced his gaze away from his wife’s and glared at the officer. “Of course, I didn’t kill Arabella! She was very much alive when I left her. Reverend DeYoung can attest to that fact. And you can ask Judge Dorner about my whereabouts the rest of the day. You’ll find him at the athletic club having a drink with Seth Tyler, the man who did this to my face.”

  “Well, until we’ve spoken to—,” The officer paused to look down at his hastily scribbled notes. “Reverend DeYoung, Judge Dorner, and Seth Taylor?”

  “Tyler.”

  “Tyler.” The man made the correction. “Well, until we’ve questioned these men, we’ll have to hold you at the jail.” He nodded at his companions, who swarmed in and seized their prisoner.

  As one of the men clamped irons on his wrists, Jake’s gaze sought Hallie’s, mutely begging her to have faith in him. But her face was carefully averted, and she refused to look at him.

  “Hallie?” he whispered, suddenly terrified, not of the charges brought against him but of the way Hallie had turned away from him. “I—”

  His words were cut off as the policemen pushed him toward the gate. Firmly holding his ground, Jake rounded on his captors, snarling, “For God’s sake! Have the decency to let me say good-bye to my wife.”

  The men looked toward their superior, who shrugged and nodded. “One minute.”

  Yanking himself from the officers’ restraint, Jake closed the distance between himself and Hallie in several long strides. She didn’t move a muscle, nor did she acknowledge his presence as he reached out to touch her.

  “Sweetheart,” he murmured, grasping her chin in his palm and forcing her head up.

  Hallie focused her gaze on the iron fetters at his wrists, unwilling to look into his eyes. She was numb, frozen inside. Jake had admitted to seeing Arabella. Her husband had tired of her already. With a sob, she jerked her face from his hands.

  “Fine. Don’t look at me,” he sighed, hating the way the tears coursed down her cheeks, despising himself for causing them to fall. “Will you just listen to me, then?”

  After a moment, she nodded.

  It was a start. “First of all, I didn’t kill Arabella.”

  Fixing her gaze on the toes of his boots, Hallie nodded.

  “Good,” he murmured. “Second. Though I was at her house this morning and have been several times during the last couple of months, there was nothing between us. Not like you’re thinking. It was all perfectly innocent. I—”

  One of the policemen grabbed Jake’s arm and gave it a tug. “Enough. It’s time to go now.”

  “Damn it! I’m not finished!” Jake ground out.

  “Hurry it up, then,” snapped the superior officer. “We can’t wait all day while you try to make up with your missus.”

  Jake gave the man restraining him a hard shove and pulled himself free. Bending close to Hallie’s ear, he whispered, “I love you. Don’t you know that I’d never do anything to jeopardize our marriage? I’d kill myself before I’d hurt you.”

  No reply.

  “Sweetheart—” He sighed heavily. His words were falling on deaf ears. “All right. If you won’t listen to me, then ask Seth or Marius what I was doing at Arabella’s. They’ll explain everything. Please … do it. I love you.”

  The desperate plea in his voice tore at Hallie’s heart. She wanted so badly to believe him. With a sob, she glanced up at him and for a split second, their eyes met. But that second was long enough for Hallie to read the truth. Jake was looking at her with such hurt, such despair, that all her doubts melted away. Only a man truly in love could be so wounded by his woman’s abandonment.

  As Jake was being escorted through the garden gate, Hallie picked up her skirts and ran to his side. Throwing her arms around her husband’s neck, she exclaimed, “I do trust you, darling.” With that, she gave him a swift, hard kiss, ignoring the way the pressure of her mouth against his split lip made him wince. “And I love you, too.”

  “Good,” Jake murmured, relief flooding through him. Tenderly, he returned her kiss.

  “Enough!” snapped one of the policemen, pushing Hallie aside and giving his prisoner a shove that almost sent him sprawling.

  Penelope shrieked her outrage at seeing her brother treated in such a manner and turned to give the man who had pushed him a severe tongue-lashing.

  “I’m coming with you!” Hallie shouted above the chaos.

  Jake, whose bad leg was beginning to give way from the policemen’s constant prodding, was now fighting to keep his balance. He looked over at his wife, and her expression of mulish determination made him smile. How could anything go wrong with Hallie in his corner? Especially when she was looking so hell-bent on fighting for him?

  Giving his head a decisive shake, he shouted back, “No. Go find Marius and bring him to the jail.” He then turned to the houseboy, who was hovering close to his other side. “Hop! Go to my club and fetch Judge Dorner and Seth.”

  The little man bobbed his head and raced off across the lawn, Ariel in his arms.

  “Penelope?”

  Penelope broke off her berating of the policeman long enough to look up at her brother.

  “Tell Celine to bake me one of her rhubarb pies. I’m innocent, and I intend to be home in time for dinner.”

  Chapter 27

  The setting sun glimmered through the stained-glass windows, unfurling ribbons of colored light across the pulpit of the Ascension Tabernacle. It was a new church, immense in its proportions and magnificent in its gothic splendor. Even though Hallie had attended services here for months, the grandeur of the sanctuary never failed to take her breath away.

  But today, as she rushed down the aisle toward the vestry, she barely spared her surroundings more than a cursory glance.

  “Marius!” She knocked once on the office door before pushing it open and entering the room. Like the rest of the church, it was deserted. Snorting her frustration, she walked over to the cluttered desk, hoping to find a clue as to the preacher’s whereabouts.

  He had obviously left in a hurry, for the ink bottle was uncorked and his pen was lying next to a piece of parchment partially covered with neat writing. Hallie picked up the paper and quickly scanned its contents.

  The mean man shall be brought down, and the mighty man shall be humbled.

  Sermon notes. It appeared that humility was to be the topic of Sunday’s lecture. With a shrug, Hallie let the paper drop from her hand. The parchment rustled softly as it drifted past the edge of the desk, spiraling downward until it came to rest at the corner of the autumn-hued carpet. As she bent forward to retrieve it, the wide expanse of her skirts belled out behind her, upsetting the dustbin beside the desk.

  Bang! Whoosh! Rubbish scattered everywhere. Cursing the impracticality of crinolines, Hallie knelt down and began to clean up the mess. As she pitched a sheath of parchments back into the bin, a colorful piece of cloth slipped free. Hallie reached for the scrape and then froze, her hand poised in midair.

  It was a scarlet silk glove, rusty with dried blood. Gingerly, she picked it up, grasping an unsoiled edge between her thumb and index finger. Two faux diamond buttons twinkled at the wrist closure, and Hallie could see a small rent in the fabric where the third had been torn away.

  She gasped in horror as comprehension dawned. It all made terrible sense now. The common denominator among the murdered women was their interest in Reverend DeYoung. Ser
ena and Arabella had both spent a great deal of time with him, heading up this committee or leading that fund-raiser, and the prostitutes had been openly enamored of the man himself.

  Why someone at the church had felt compelled to kill the women was a question Hallie couldn’t begin to fathom. She shook her head and hastily stuffed the glove into her reticule. Perhaps the police could figure it out.

  As she made to rise to her feet, she heard a creaking sound directly behind her, followed by a soft scraping. With a startled gasp, she swung her head around. But before she could identify the dark figure hovering over her, pain exploded through her head. Then everything went black.

  When Hallie regained consciousness, she found herself lying face down on a hard wood-planked floor. Her hands were numb from being tied behind her back, and the corners of her mouth ached from being stretched by the too-tight gag.

  Moaning, she rolled onto her side, trying to peer around her. Except for a faint glimmer of light shining beneath a door, she was completely engulfed in darkness. There was a familiar musty smell permeating the space, and as her eyes adjusted to the dimness, she was able to make out the outlines of flat items piled in towering stacks on either side of her.

  Hallie sighed. She had no idea where she was. All she knew was that she was cold and stiff, and her legs hurt. Groaning into the gag, she stretched her bound legs, trying to ease the cramps. She succeeded only in toppling one of the piles.

  Books, she thought, wincing as she was repeatedly bombarded by falling volumes. Lying half buried beneath what felt like the entire literary collection from the San Francisco library, Hallie now realized where she was. She was in the small room behind the altar where the extra hymnals and seasonal decorations were stored.

  “Hallie!”

  Hallie’s breath caught in her throat as she heard the barely audible syllables of her name penetrating through the door.

  “Hallie!”

  This time the voice was louder … nearer. A whimper escaped her lips.