Deadly Proof: A Victorian San Francisco Mystery

by Locke, M. Louisa

  She said, “If Dart calls Alan Sullivan to testify, do you think he can get him to say he was worried there was something going on between Florence and Rashers?”

  “California criminal law excludes a husband from testifying against his wife—unless they both agree, so at least I don’t have to worry about that.”

  Nodding, Annie said, “Ah...yes I guess I knew that. But couldn’t Mr. Sullivan be a positive help—I mean if he insisted that there was nothing going on between his wife and Rashers?”

  “Cranston warned me that it is never a good idea to call the spouse to testify. Most jurors assume the spouse is lying, and you never know what dirty little marital secret the prosecutor will bring up that will end up undermining your case.”

  Annie looked pensive. She then said, “I suppose this is a reason why it might not be such a good idea to get someone like that box factory woman up to testify––even if she could show that Rashers wasn’t quite the paragon of virtue his wife claims he was.”

  This reminded Nate of the visit from his sister earlier this evening. “Did Laura tell you her wild theory that Iris Bailor might be the murderer—trying to protect her friend the illustrator?”

  “No! Oh my, why does she think that?”

  “She found out Iris and Miss Granger had a fight that Friday night, and while the illustrator has an alibi, Miss Bailor was evidently out somewhere.”

  “And Laura thinks she was off killing Rashers?”

  “Yes. I told her that this was highly unlikely. But I confess it did occur to me later that this would explain why Mrs. Sullivan doesn’t want me to pursue any other suspects. What if she knows something...like Iris had threatened to go speak to him?”

  Annie shifted in her seat next to him. “I’ve hardly seen Laura the past few days. She is off to work early, then home to study. She did ask me to tell you to take your time with the jury selection the first day of the trial. Her entrance examination time is set for one o’clock next Monday afternoon, and she will be devastated if you have given your opening statement before she can get back over from the university.”

  Nate was startled. He hadn’t really thought about his sister being part of the audience. Of course she would want to be there if she could, as would Annie. But should he ask either one to forgo their own work? Especially since he knew Annie was anxious about saving up money to pay for the wedding. Yet, it would really help to know that if he looked up while giving his opening speech that he would see Annie’s encouraging smile...

  Annie interrupted this thought, saying, “What about the building’s porters? Are they testifying? Did Seth Timmons find out anything from them?”

  Nate shook his head. “Dart is having Crockett, the night porter, testify, I guess to confirm that Seth, Dunk, and Griggs left together at six-thirty and that Florence arrived at seven-fifteen. But Seth sent me a note this morning saying that he talked to both the day porters and the night porter, but none of them saw anyone behaving suspiciously. But it was the Friday before the July Fourth weekend, and there were more people on the streets and going in and out of the building than usual.”

  “Oh, dear. I forgot about that. The Fourth seems a lifetime away by now.”

  “Unfortunately, despite two and a half weeks having passed, we still know practically nothing about what happened that night. Oh, were you able to get in to see Mrs. Sullivan yesterday?”

  “No, when I arrived she was meeting with her mother—which I saw as a good thing. But I left her a note that I would try to drop by on Thursday or Friday. I hope she agrees to see me because I found something I really want to ask her. You know that I found evidence that Rashers was in the process of raiding another firm’s customers again?”

  “Yes, that could be vital information. Did you figure out whose firm he’d been targeting?”

  “I did. This morning, I asked Mrs. Richmond, the WCPU owner, and found out that the three new clients were former customers of Neppier and Son, an old print shop run by a man in his late sixties, James Neppier.”

  “So Neppier could be a potential suspect.” Nate wondered if he should try to get an interview with him.

  “Maybe, but Mrs. Richmond said that the three clients were small fry—their loss alone shouldn’t ruin Neppier. However, she thought it could push the firm to bankruptcy if Rashers was successful in winning away Neppier’s two largest customers, the Daily Alta, and the Union Insurance Company.”

  “Is there any sign that Rashers was trying to get these two customers to jump ship?” Nate felt a spurt of hope. He would much prefer to undermine Rashers’ reputation by calling a desperate and angry printer to the stand—even if he turned out to have an alibi—than some working woman like Miss Von Klepp or Iris Bailor.

  Annie said, “I didn’t find them mentioned in the correspondence. But I did find some odd entries in his desk diary that suggest he was meeting secretly with someone. Different hotels, different times, but no name given—which was unusual. I thought these meetings might be with someone who was feeding him inside information about those two firms. Then it would make sense that Rashers would want to keep these meetings secret.”

  “And you think that Mrs. Sullivan might know who he was meeting?”

  “Yes, I was hoping she would at least have a good idea.”

  All at once, Nate thought of a different reason for these meetings being secret, and he said, “But isn’t it even more possible that Rashers was keeping these meetings secret because they were with someone with whom he was having an affair? And couldn’t that person be Mrs. Sullivan herself?”

  Annie said, “All the more reason for me to ask her about the meetings. As Madam Sibyl, I’ve learned to figure out what someone is thinking from their facial expressions, so I think I should be able to tell if she were the person Rashers was meeting. And wouldn’t it be better for you to learn before the trial started that she had started back up with him?”

  Nate stood up and went over to poke at the remaining embers in the grate, suddenly feeling cold in his shirt sleeves. Annie rose and came over to stand beside him.

  She said, “I know this is hard. But even if she was having an affair with him, this doesn’t mean she killed him. As you said at the start, it isn’t your job to judge her but to defend her, which I know you will do to the best of your abilities.”

  “That’s just it. What are my abilities? I don’t know, and I am deathly afraid Dart is going to make mincemeat of me.”

  Annie touched his shoulder and said, “You are just getting nervous because this is your first solo trial.”

  “With good reason. Let’s look at the facts. The prosecution has a grieving widow who will testify that Florence Sullivan was obsessed with her husband, a murder weapon that probably belonged to my client, and an eyewitness who saw her come out of the dead man’s office all covered in his blood, with the incriminating invitation that she typeset lying under the victim’s body. And, just as Mrs. Pitts Stevens feared, the press have already convicted her in their pages.”

  “Nate, I am sure it isn’t as desperate as all that. You can convince the jury otherwise; I know you can.”

  “With what? I have nothing but some medical testimony that the assault could have come earlier, a couple of employees who say the accused didn’t seem to be in love with her boss, and a client whose whole demeanor makes her look guilty as all get-out.”

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Friday, afternoon, July 23, 1880

  “It is well known to every printer that one of the heaviest items of expense in publishing a daily paper is the cost of white paper.” San Francisco Chronicle, April 22, 1880

  Annie lengthened her stride as she turned onto Market Street from O’Farrell and felt some of her tiredness slip away. Fridays were always busy for her. A number of her male clients liked to meet early in the day so they could then meet with their brokers before the stock exchange got into full swing. Then she had a ten o’clock appointment with J. T. Green, the financial secretary of the Wid
ows’ and Orphans’ Aid Association of the Police Department of San Francisco. This was a new job for her, one that she owed to Beatrice O’Rourke, who was the widow of a former San Francisco policeman and an old friend of Mr. Green’s. A welcome addition to her coffers as well, since Beatrice seemed daily to be adding to the number of expensive delicacies she was planning for the wedding reception dinner.

  During lunch she worked on catching up on her reading in the California Farmer and Journal of Useful Sciences and the Commercial Herald and Market Review, where she found many of her investment tips. Then she combed through Langley’s San Francisco Directory and McKenny’s Pacific Coast Directory to track down who among the employees at the Daily Alta and the Union Insurance Company might have been meeting secretly with Rashers in the weeks before his death. She found four possibilities and was going to run their names by her boarder Herman Stein when he got back in town tomorrow from one of his frequent business trips to Portland.

  Then at three, as she did most every week, she met with Gracie McRath, a young, newly married woman who was having trouble dealing with Malvina, her sister-in-law who lived with them. Gracie began meeting with Madam Sibyl last fall, but she seemed relieved in March when Annie told her she was now seeing clients as just Mrs. Fuller. Gracie told her she’d lived in fear that Malvina would find out she was seeing a fortuneteller. Now she could just say she was visiting her old friend, Mrs. Fuller.

  Soon to be Mrs. Dawson.

  Annie would ask Laura to print up some business cards announcing the name change that she could give out to her clients. Maybe spend the money to put a small ad in the Chronicle advertising her services under her new married name. She’d decided to go by Mrs. Ann E. Stewart Dawson for business purposes. She hoped the inclusion of her maiden name would still resonate with those men in town who remembered her father, Edward Stewart, as the famous San Francisco stockbroker of the eighteen-fifties.

  Nate hadn’t even asked her about the name change. Surely he wasn’t worried she would hang on to Fuller? The sooner she was rid of any connection with her first husband, John, and his family name, the better. She just hoped that Nate’s parents weren’t sticklers for convention—which would mean they expected her to be called Mrs. Nathaniel Dawson. She’d only met them once, last Christmas, when she visited Nate at their ranch down the peninsula. But between the fuss over Nate’s new nephew and the excitement over Laura’s news about moving up to San Francisco to teach, she couldn’t say she really got to know either of them. Nate’s mother wrote her a very nice note when Nate told them of their engagement. But she didn’t know what they thought about her career as Madam Sibyl.

  In any case, she wanted everything to go well with the wedding so his parents wouldn’t question his decision to marry her. She hoped they would be pleased with the invitation when they got it. Laura brought home a proof copy of it for Annie to see last evening. It was simply beautiful. That was one of the reasons she was visiting Nate this afternoon. He should have gotten a response from his parents by now about the date, and she wanted to show him the invitation and get his approval so Laura could have them printed up tomorrow morning and she could get them in the mail that afternoon.

  She hoped this might cheer him up. While she was pleased he’d trusted her enough on Tuesday evening to confess his fears about the upcoming trial, she’d hated sending him home in that black mood. Once they were married, it would be different. Then she would have numerous ways to lighten his spirits...

  Smiling at that thought, she turned off Market and briskly walked up Sansome Street. It only took about twenty minutes to get from her boarding house to Nate’s law offices, and after sitting all day it felt good to stretch her legs and feel the sun on her face. Or she would be feeling the sun if Beatrice hadn’t scolded her and made her take her parasol, reminding her that she didn’t want to have freckles running across her nose and cheeks for the wedding. Annie envied Laura for her darker coloring, noticing that a day in the sun just deepened her skin’s lovely glow. She just burned and freckled, which didn’t go particularly well with her reddish blonde hair and pale skin or the lovely dress the Moffets were making for her. She’d had one fitting so far, but they made her close her eyes, insisting they wanted the finished dress to be a surprise.

  That was all right with her. All she cared about was the look in Nate’s eyes as she came down the aisle.

  *****

  A few minutes later, she stood in the open doorway to Nate’s office and silently observed him. His head propped up by his left fist, he was scratching out a line of writing with his pen. He looked exhausted. As if he hadn’t slept. Annie felt guilty about having kept him at the boarding house so late Tuesday night. Each time they separated, she longed more acutely for the time when the end of the day meant climbing the stairs up to their room where their bed lay waiting for them.

  “How is it going?” she said as she walked into the room.

  “Terribly.” He stood up, crumpling the paper, and tossing it into a metal bin beside the desk. “I’ve discovered I can’t write a simple declarative sentence without sounding like a pompous idiot.”

  “Didn’t you write some of the opening statement for Cranston in the last trial you did with him?”

  “Yes, but he gave me the basic outline. However, I get your point. Please sit down and tell me what I have done to deserve the pleasure of your company. Didn’t you say you had clients to see this evening?”

  “Yes, but not until seven.” Annie sat down, leaning her parasol against the desk and then taking out an envelope from her purse. “I wanted you to see what your sister has designed for our invitations.”

  Nate took the thick square piece of card stock she pulled from the envelope, which read:

  You are Cordially Invited

  To Celebrate the Marriage of

  Mrs. Ann Elizabeth Stewart Fuller

  —and—

  Mr. Nathaniel Robert Dawson

  Wednesday, August 11, 1880

  Seven o’clock in the evening

  St. Mark’s Lutheran Church

  Reception to follow

  “Laura assured me that this is the common language used when the bride doesn’t have family to give her away. Don’t you love the way she used a flower motif for the borders?”

  Annie’s heart beat a bit faster waiting for his reaction to the invitation. Laura had supported Annie in her decision not to list the Steins on the invitation, even though Mr. Stein was walking her down the aisle. Then she’d undermined all her reassurance when she told Annie not to mind if Violet said something cutting about its unconventionality. Annie didn’t care about Violet’s reaction, but she didn’t want to do anything to upset her future mother-in-law.

  Nate looked up at her and said, “Annie my love, I can’t imagine you letting anyone give you away—under any circumstances.”

  He then laughed, completely untying the knot that had been in her stomach.

  She smiled and said, “Can you believe it? Until Laura told me, I didn’t know your middle name was Robert.”

  “Well, I...yes, Rodgers, what is it?” Nate looked over at the door to the office.

  The firm’s law clerk stood there, obviously reluctant to interrupt, but he replied, “Sir, this message just arrived, and since it was from Judge Ferrel, I thought you should see it right away.”

  When Rodgers handed the letter over to him and went out, Nate asked Annie’s pardon and opened up the envelope to read its contents. He frowned, then looked up at her, his eyes telegraphing that it was bad news.

  “What is it? What’s happened? It isn’t Mrs. Sullivan? I know you were worried about the state of her health.”

  “No, Annie, that isn’t it. Judge Ferrel writes that Judge Tannebaum, who was to preside over a criminal case in Santa Barbara, has taken ill. Judge Ferrel has agreed to step in for him. This necessitates that he delay Mrs. Sullivan’s trial until Wednesday, August 11th.”

  “Oh Nate, that is the day of the wedding!” Then, se
eing the expression on Nate’s face, she took a deep breath and said more calmly, “Of course this means we can’t get married then, can we? Would your parents be able to come if we put it off two or three weeks?”

  Nate shook his head. “This was the one small window of time they had before the fall round-up.”

  Her heart sank. “When would they and your brother and sister-in-law be free again?”

  Nate sighed, then he stood up and came over to crouch down beside her, taking her hand in his, saying, “To be safe, we should probably reschedule it for mid-October. Oh darling, I am so sorry. I wish I had never taken this damned case.”

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Friday, evening, July 30, 1880

  “Slugs are used to fill out a short page or between display lines.” E.H. Knight, The Practical Dictionary of Mechanics, 1875

  “Kathleen said my brother is coming this evening,” said Laura. She stood at the window in Annie’s bedroom, looking down into the street through the curtains, the faint glow of the setting sun lighting up her face. “Have you seen him at all this week?”

  Annie looked up from where she sat on a cushion next to the fireplace, drying her hair. “No, he’s been too busy. But he should be here around seven-thirty. Beatrice is fixing us a light supper, which we will have in the parlor. Why don’t you stop by? I am sure he will be glad to see you.”

  Laura turned around and said, “I got a letter from Mother this morning.”

  “And?”

  “Well, of course she understands why the wedding needed to be postponed. But she asked me if she should come on up by train anyway—for the trial itself. Evidently, a neighbor showed her some old copies of the Morning Call that had those wretched articles about Mrs. Sullivan.”

  “Oh dear.” Annie got up, disturbing the kitchen cat Queenie, who was sitting beside her. Queenie moved onto the now-vacant cushion, circled twice, then sunk down purring.