“It’s a shame Ana isn’t here, she would have enjoyed this too,” Ruby said.
“Unless, of course, she learned we’re celebrating the demise of her homeland. Look! Here come some elephants—and what are those animals with the big humps on their backs?”
“Camels!” cried Aiden, and Edward patted his leg.
“Good boy.”
Besides the exotic animals, soldiers, volunteer firemen, and ethnic community organizations joined businesses and banks in marching. McAuliffe’s Irish whiskey held a sign that said, DON’T AVOID THE DRAUGHT. Sailors carried ship models, including one of the ironclad Monitor. One placard boldly proclaimed: OIL IS KING NOW, NOT COTTON.
“I suppose it doesn’t exactly put out the welcome mat for the Southern families in our midst, eh?”
At least Edward could talk to Ruby again. Their relationship had healed tremendously since their carriage-ride conversation the night of the hotel fires. Still, they felt more like amiable housemates than husband and wife.
Edward caught Ruby watching him, and matched her smile with his own. They were the smiles of friends. Not lovers.
“Ruby?”
Emma Connors emerged from the crowd and Edward stifled a groan. He had never been quite sure how to conduct himself around her.
“Why, Emma!” Ruby looped her arm through her friend’s elbow. “So good to see you here!”
Emma kissed her cheek, then shielded her eyes as she squinted up at Aiden. “Oh my, no. This canna be the bonnie wee laddie named Aiden, can it?”
Ruby beamed with pride over her growing son. She tapped Edward’s arm, then reached up to take Aiden down. “Aye, this is him!”
“Oh look at you now!” Emma ruffled his curly locks with her hand, and for the first time, Ruby wondered if she pined for a family of her own.
“Would you like to hold him? He’s heavy. Aiden, would you let Emma hold you, darlin’?”
Emma hoisted him onto her hip, and he draped a chubby arm around her neck. Ruby could almost see her friend melting. “You’re not too heavy for me!” She bounced him just a bit. “You are just exactly the way you should be. Perfect.”
Ruby laughed. “Not always.” She sought Edward’s eye, but he was staring straight ahead at the parade.
Emma noticed. “Why don’t I walk around with him for a wee bit? Give you and Edward a little time to yourselves.”
Ruby laughed. “To ourselves? How many thousands of people do you suppose there are here?” But she knew what Emma meant. It might be nice to interact without frequent interruptions from Aiden. “All right, you win. Don’t feel like you have to stay away long, though. Ten minutes? Right back here on this corner?”
“Aye, see you then!”
Ruby smiled as she watched them sway through the crowd and out of sight.
“Don’t look now, but someone just walked off with your son,” Edward teased.
Ruby slipped her hand into his and squeezed. “Nothing gets past you, does it?”
Ten minutes flew by.
And then five more. Then ten. By the time thirty minutes had passed, Edward looked as anxious as Ruby.
Then, “Ruby!”
“Oh thank God, Emma, you scared me! Twenty minutes late, did you get lost? Where’s—Where’s Aiden?”
Emma’s eyes hardened. “He’s safe. With Sean.”
A ridge popped between Edward’s eyebrows as Ruby grasped for his arm. “Excuse me?”
“Just while you and I take care of a little business is all. But not here. Much too noisy. Shall we go back to your place?”
Edward leaned in. “Whatever game you’re playing, you can stop right now. Where’s the boy?”
“I told you. You’ll not get him until you all take care of something for me.” She cocked her head in that self-assured way Ruby had never learned to master. “Let’s go.”
Ruby looked up at Edward, shook her head. She was just as confused as he was, and likely ten times as alarmed.
Back in the Sixteenth Street brownstone, Emma walked to the front parlor and sat.
“What do you want?” Edward growled.
“Only what’s rightfully mine. I’ve been sewing with you more than a year now, Ruby Shannon, and I don’t believe I’ve collected a fair share.”
Ruby spread her hands. “Well then, what’s fair?”
“I’ll tell you what isn’t fair. ’Tis a crying shame you got a husband, a son, a house, and a business, and all I got is a brother who can’t pull himself out of the bottle and a disease I’ll never be cured of. And are we so very different, you and me, after all? How is it you got all the blessings, and I got only curses?”
Ruby gasped. “Are you ill? I didn’t know!”
Emma rolled her eyes. “Think on it, Rubes. A girl in my line of work? Bound to happen sooner or later.”
“But I thought you—”
“Gave it up? Not soon enough. And since our sewing business dried up I had to go right back to it.”
Ruby’s stomach turned, and she feared it would reject its contents. Emma had reverted to prostitution.
“Now. As I said, I want what’s mine, I do. But don’t worry. This won’t hurt a bit.” She pointed to an expensive painting in a gilt-edged frame. “She’ll never miss it.”
“I can’t give you that, it doesn’t belong to me.” Her voice shook with both conviction and fear.
“Jewels, then. What did the old missus leave behind?”
Edward put out his hand. “We’re not giving you Mrs. Waverly’s things.”
“Then cash will do nicely. Five thousand dollars, if you please.”
Ruby blinked. “Are you in earnest?”
“No cash, no boy.”
“This is ridiculous.” Edward hooked Emma’s arm. “We’re going for a walk.”
“Where?”
“The police station, where I’m reporting you and your brother for extortion and kidnapping. I’m sure they’d be very interested in hearing about your disease while we’re at it too, and just exactly how you contracted it. Let’s go.”
“Oh, all right, all right!” Emma fought against Edward’s grasp. “We were just shaking the tree to see if anything would fall out. I’ll take you to Sean, no need to get the police involved. Bedad!”
“Where is he?” Ruby asked, nerves jangling.
“Back at Five Points.”
Ruby’s spirit groaned in protest. Every fear she had harbored for Aiden had its root in that nest of crime and sin. The worst thing that could happen was that he would develop a fascination, and then an appetite for that kind of life. And that was where Sean had him. He could be giving him nips from his flask right now!
With his face as much like a thundercloud as Ruby had ever seen, Edward hitched the carriage to the horse.
“How could you, Emma?” Ruby whispered as they climbed up into the Concord.
“Sean. He says he needs the money, although I don’t know where he puts it. Gambles it all away. I’m likely as mad at him as you are.”
Not likely. “It was a vicious trick. If any harm should come to his body or spirit—” She would not know how to fix it. There was little else to say as they rode south on side streets parallel to the procession route. It was two and a half miles away, but it felt like the entire length of Manhattan.
Emma directed Edward to the intersection for which Five Points was named. Ruby craned her neck, heartbeat thrumming above children hawking apples, and unshaven men joking coarsely with bright-cheeked women. “Where is he?”
“I—I don’t know, he said he’d be right here at this corner!”
“If this is another trick, Miss Connors—” Edward growled at Emma, but Ruby could read in her wild, darting eyes that it wasn’t.
Dread spiraled through Ruby as Edward steered the carriage through decaying vegetable matter, apple cores, horse manure, and pig droppings. Splattered with filth up to his fetlocks, Justus zigzagged the Concord up Baxter Street, across Park Street, through Mulberry and Mott. They check
ed every street corner in the Fourth and Sixth Wards, calling out Sean’s name into the erratic dissonance of Five Points. Pressing her handkerchief to her nose, Ruby fought to keep from gagging on the odor of the open sinks behind the tenements. Weathered wooden flophouses, gropshops, and brothels leaned drunkenly into each other. Yawning doorways seemed to mock Ruby, who had been loath to live here herself, and was now searching this den of vice for her son.
“He might have gone back to our rooms,” Emma offered.
But he hadn’t. They found Emma and Sean’s apartment as hollow as Ruby’s hope. Her knees weakened with growing despair, and Edward caught her waist to his side.
“We’re going home.” His voice was gruff. “They might be waiting for us there.” But his eyes were dark with doubt.
When they found the Waverly brownstone and gardens just as empty, fear wrapped coldly around Ruby. “They might still come …” she rasped.
“I’m going to the police.” Edward’s breath came shorter. “Miss Connors—”
“Please don’t take her.” Ruby grabbed Emma’s arm. “I don’t want to be alone with Sean if he comes while you’re gone!”
Face ashen, Edward raked his hand through his hair. Tension puckered his brow. “You’ll forgive me for not quite trusting you, Miss Connors.”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Goodrich, I don’t know what’s gotten into Sean! But you’ll not be leaving Ruby alone like this, and someone needs to be here in case the boys do come this way.”
He flicked his gaze heavenward before meeting Ruby’s gaze with troubled eyes. “I’ll stop at Father’s on my way to the station. He and Aunt Vivian will come back to sit with you. After the station I just might search Central Park. Will you be all right with Aunt Viv and Father?”
Ruby nodded, but did not feel his lips brush on her cheek. She was numb, and she could not stop shaking.
The door latched behind Edward and Ruby stood there, staring at its walnut panels and seeing nothing. Aiden is gone.
“’Twas never supposed to go this far, darlin’.” Emma gently guided her to the sofa in the parlor. “You have to believe me. Sean’ll come blowing in any minute, he will, and your bonnie wee laddie with him.”
He is gone. My son is gone.
“I’ll—I’ll put on some tea.”
Ruby blinked, and suddenly a hot cup was in her trembling hands, steam breathing into her face. “Emma.” Her voice was flat. “I’ve never mothered a child past the age of three.” Meghan had died an infant. Consumption took Fiona when she was only months older than Aiden.
“Bedad, Ruby Shannon! Aiden’s not dead, you goose!” Her laugh was shrill. “We just don’t know where he is!”
“Then find him!” Ruby jerked, and her tea sloshed out of its cup. The burn was nothing against the desperation now boiling beneath her skin. “I can’t stay here when my son is out there somewhere. You know your brother better than anyone else. Where is he? Where is my son?”
Emma’s eyes grew wide. Her lips were a thin red line. “If he’s not home, and he’s not here, there’s only one place he would be.”
“You’re sure?”
“If he isn’t, there’ll be someone there who’s seen him.”
Ruby clunked her cup onto the table and stood with shaky legs. “I’m coming with you.”
Emma plucked her shawl from the hall rack. “Will you not stay and wait for Edward’s father and aunt?”
“I can’t stay here,” Ruby said again, tears coursing down her cheeks. “I’ll go mad.” She followed Emma out the door to chase a gossamer thread of hope.
“Sean! Bedad! What in the name of St. Patrick can you be doing?”
Ruby’s limbs turned to stone as Emma flailed against her brother. He had staggered out of Fatty Walsh’s saloon. Alone.
“Where’s the boy?” Emma shrieked.
“Where’s the money?” His speech slurred around his swollen tongue.
“They haven’t got it, you dolt! Give Aiden back to his mother now, it was a stupid plan!”
“Maybe.” Puffy eyes drooped with drink. “But looky here.” He withdrew a wad of cash from his trouser pocket and thumbed through it with grimy fingers. “Sort of worked out, see? And this isn’t even the whole of it. Figured it wouldn’t hurt to celebrate with some refreshments right away.”
“Who’d you steal that from?” Emma asked.
“Nobody. It’s a bonus. Yeah, that’s what he called it, a bonus.”
“But where is my son?” The pressure of the unknown ballooned inside her until her head felt like it would burst.
Sean shrugged, smelled his money. “Ask him who paid me for him.”
“What?” Horror strangled Ruby’s voice.
“Aw, don’t worry. ’Twas not a thug who bought him. ’Twas Pease. Lewis Pease.”
“Of the Five Points Mission? The House of Industry?” Slowly, the cogs of Ruby’s mind turned. She had met him once. Charlotte Waverly had worked with him in the House of Industry before the war started.
“The same. Said I wasn’t fit to care for the lad, he did. He asked me to hand him over. I said no, that the lad was going to make me some money. He offered to pay me this bonus so he could take care of the lad at the Mission. So you see, lassies? Everyone is happy.” He tipped a bottle to his mouth again, then swiped the back of his hand over his face. “Aiden is safe, and I still got paid.”
Ruby gasped with relief so intense it nearly swept her off her feet. With new energy trickling through her whiplashed spirit, she wordlessly headed for the Mission. Aiden was safe, and mere blocks away.
Bursting through the doors of the Five Points Mission, Ruby scanned the Spartan foyer with eyes ravenous for sight of her son.
“Can I help—ah. So you’ve come. Hello again, Ruby.” Mr. Lewis Pease loomed before her, as did their conversation from three years ago. Obviously, he had not forgotten it, either.
Desperate for income, Ruby had applied to be a sewing instructor at the House of Industry. The only name she’d been able to supply as a character reference was Emma Connors. When Mr. Pease learned that Ruby had withheld the fact that Emma was a working prostitute, he had labeled her a liar and turned her out. He rubbed his jaw as he assessed her now. “Is this about the boy I found with Sean Connors?”
“That boy is my son. I thank you for keeping him this afternoon, but I’ll take him now. Please.” He must be terrified after this ordeal. “He’s my son.”
But Mr. Pease made no move. “Do you know how I found him? Drinking whiskey from Sean Connors’ flask. Making mud pies from animal droppings.”
Revulsion wrenched Ruby’s gut. “I thank you for removing him from such a depraved influence, truly. I’ll take him back, now.”
“Where’s the laddie, Mr. Pease?” Emma piped up beside Ruby. “Didn’t you hear her? That’s her son you’ve got.”
“I heard her.” He leveled his gaze at Emma. “I already learned from Mr. Connors that Aiden is Ruby’s son. And I already know Ruby’s a prostitute, another reason I removed the boy.”
Fire blazed in Ruby’s cheeks. “I’m not a prostitute,” she gasped. “Not anymore.”
“I’ve heard that before. I didn’t believe you three years ago, and I don’t believe you now.”
“I’ve changed!”
“Yet here you are, in the company of Emma Connors, another who famously plies the same seedy trade. And your son was left in the company of a drunk. What kind of mother would do such a thing?”
Aiden was kidnapped. It wasn’t my fault. But the words cleaved to her tongue.
“Ruby’s no prostitute, Mr. Pease, I’ll tell you that. She’s married to a chaplain, she is!”
Mr. Pease narrowed his gaze. “Edward Goodrich, yes, I know. Just lost a chance at the pastorate of my mother’s church because of his wife’s—that would be you—prostitution. Am I right? So you see, I still have trouble trusting you.”
His words whipped the breath from Ruby’s chest. Mute with shock, she slumped against Emma for su
pport.
“I don’t believe Aiden is in a suitable home. I believe he would do better raised by another family, somewhere far from the city.”
“The Goodriches live in the finest home I’ve ever been inside,” chimed Emma. “The Waverly brownstone, 16th Street!”
“Waverly?” Mr. Pease frowned. “As in, Charlotte Waverly?”
Ruby nodded.
“Charlotte used to work in the House of Industry with us before the war started. Why are you now living in her home?”
“I—I was a domestic there for her mother, Caroline. We live there still.”
His eyebrows arched. “You don’t say. Then you won’t mind if I speak to Mrs. Caroline Waverly to confirm this.”
“You can’t.” Emma’s voice grew shriller with every word. “You’ll just have to trust us, you will! Mrs. Waverly doesn’t live there right now, neither does Charlotte. It’s just Ruby, Edward, and Aiden.”
“Squatting on the property, are you?” Mr. Pease shook his head, muttered something Ruby could not hear over the rushing of her blood in her ears.
“No, no, you don’t understand!” Ruby cried. “It was Mrs. Waverly’s idea in the first place!”
Mr. Pease barked a laugh from his throat. “Caroline Waverly? Oh no. Absolutely unbelievable. Charlotte’s mother forbade Charlotte to continue working with us here in Five Points. If she couldn’t abide her daughter serving in the House of Industry once a week, she most certainly would not leave her home in the hands of a prostitute.”
Ruby flailed in the tide of distrust. Swirling half-truths crashed and roared in her ears. Enough of this! Desperation curled her fingers as she latched onto Mr. Pease’s arm.”Where is my son? Give me my son!” Her tone was as raw as her heart.
“He’s gone.”
Air crushed from her lungs, Ruby’s cry died in her throat.
“I put him on a train this afternoon along with a dozen other orphans and half-orphans. He’s headed to Iowa as we speak, where a nice farming family will adopt him and give him the wholesome upbringing you never could, away from the city’s filthy influence. He will forget you, and grow into a decent man.”
Yankee in Atlanta Page 34
