by Rhys Bowen
So I set to work on my other task—writing to the employment agencies inquiring about Maureen O’Byrne and Mrs. Mainwaring. On the sofa I noticed my latest piece of sewing, lying rumpled and unattractive, waiting to be finished. If I managed to locate Maureen, I’d accept a modest fee that would enable me to buy all the undergarments a baby needed. I was on my fourth letter when I heard a tap at the front door. I went to open it and found Mr. Wilkie standing there.
“Mr. Wilkie,” I exclaimed.
“Mrs. Sullivan, I’m sorry to disturb you, but I believe I may have put down my gloves in your parlor,” he said.
“I don’t think so,” I began, “but please do come and take a look.”
He strode ahead of me into the parlor, looked around briefly, and then said, “No, you’re right, they’re not here. Then I must have left them in the police department automobile. No doubt your husband will find them.”
He hesitated, as if reluctant to leave, and it suddenly came to me that the gloves had been an excuse to return here. He wanted to find me alone. He was going to ask me to work for him, in spite of Daniel’s protests. I felt a thrill of excitement rush through me. I would have to turn him down, of course. But nevertheless it was flattering to be asked.
“Was there something else, Mr. Wilkie?” I asked. “I sensed when you came for lunch that important men like you don’t take time out of a busy schedule to pay social calls on the wives of colleagues for no reason at all.”
Wilkie chucked. “What did I say? Sharp, Mrs. Sullivan. Sharp as a tack. There was something, that I didn’t want to bring up in front of your husband, but I never found the opportunity for a second alone with you during luncheon. May I sit down?” He chose Daniel’s leather club chair and sat, motioning me to take a seat on the sofa. I tried not to look too keen or interested as I assumed a modest pose with hands folded in my lap.
“Mrs. Sullivan this is a rather delicate matter,” he said. “One I don’t wish to share with your husband for obvious reasons.”
For one absurd second it crossed my mind that it was my body he was interested in, and not my sharp brain. Then I reminded myself that no man would choose as a mistress someone in my present condition. He cleared his throat as if trying to find the right words. I was really intrigued now.
“You have a brother, I believe,” he said at last.
“I have two brothers still living,” I said.
“Would it surprise you to know that one of them, Liam Murphy, is in New York at this very moment?”
I checked myself before I answered, “Liam?” I feigned surprise. “In New York? That can’t be true.”
“So he has not contacted you then?”
“He’d have no way of contacting me. He doesn’t know my address or anything about me. We were never close and I haven’t heard from him in years. Are you sure it’s my brother? There are plenty of young Irishmen called Liam Murphy, and plenty more with red hair.”
“It’s him right enough,” Mr. Wilkie said. “My counterparts in Britain have been keeping tabs on him and his Republican Brotherhood and they notified me that he’d sailed from Le Havre in France, heading for the United States.” When I said nothing he looked up, his gaze holding mine. “You did know that your brother is part of the Republican Brotherhood, I take it?”
I realized then that nobody had connected me to that failed prison break in Dublin. One of them had given his life to spirit me away. “I suspected as much,” I said. “Liam always did have a strong sense of justice, and what red-blooded Irishman would not want to fight to gain independence for his own country? We’ve been an occupied country for three hundred years, you know. And America did exactly the same thing in 1776 to free themselves from the British yoke.”
Mr. Wilkie had to smile at this. “It’s not my place to judge the righteousness of his cause,” he said, “but I am bound to cooperate with my counterparts in Britain and your brother is wanted on a capital charge over there.”
“Do you know what made him come to America?” I demanded and I could hear the belligerent tone in my voice now. “Is it possible he’s seen the hopelessness of the Republican cause and has decided to try for a better life for himself in America, the same as all those other immigrants?”
“If that were true, I’d say good luck to him,” Mr. Wilkie said. “But I’m afraid that we have credible intelligence that he’s here on Republican Brotherhood business.”
“Raising money, you mean?”
“Possibly. The Irish in America are known to be more than generous when it comes to the Home Rule cause. And not just with money. Weapons too. It could be that he’s here to acquire weapons.” He paused. I remembered being involved in smuggling a trunk full of rifles to Ireland, but tried to keep my face composed. “It’s possible, I suppose,” I said.
“But we are concerned it may be more than that,” Wilkie continued. “I mentioned a newly formed anarchist group to you. We have gotten wind that they are planning some kind of coup, and the Irish Republican Brotherhood may be involved.”
“Why are you telling me all this?” I asked.
“Because your brother may well try to contact you, to ask for assistance,” Mr. Wilkie said.
“And if he does?”
“Then I’d like you to let me know.”
“You want me to betray my own brother?” I rose to my feet.
“It’s a question of whether family loyalty should come before the greater good. If this group is planning something that involves the killing of innocent people, for example—where would your loyalties lie then? And how would it look if the wife of a distinguished police captain might be implicated as an accessory if you did not turn in your brother?”
“Would you turn your own brother in to the authorities, knowing that he’d be hanged when all he tried to do was rescue our other brother from jail?” I stood there, hands on hips and really angry now.
“Maybe we can come to some sort of arrangement,” Mr. Wilkie said softly. “I may be able to find a way for him to stay here in America, with a new identity—a chance for a new life, if he agrees to give up his connections to the Brotherhood. What do you say—wouldn’t you rather your brother was here safely, able to make a good life for himself?”
“Of course I’d want that,” I said, “but I’m not my brother. That decision would have to come from him. But this is all a moot point, Mr. Wilkie. Liam has not tried to contact me and I think it’s unlikely that he will for the very reason you suggested. He would not want to implicate me in any of his schemes.”
Mr. Wilkie had also risen to his feet. “I’ve taken enough of your time, Mrs. Sullivan, and I’m truly sorry to have caused you any distress. All I can say is that I will do what is within my power to help your brother if he puts himself in my hands. You’ll tell him that at least, won’t you, if he shows up on your doorstep one night?”
“I’ll tell him that,” I agreed. “If he shows up on my doorstep.”
Mr. Wilkie picked up his hat and placed it on his head. “Then I take my leave of you. Oh, and I see no reason to mention this conversation to your husband. He doesn’t know anything yet about your brother’s possible involvement in this matter. Good day to you, Mrs. Sullivan.”
“And to you too, Mr. Wilkie,” I said.
“I can let myself out,” he said and went.
Eight
I slumped back onto the sofa, the wind knocked from my sails. Actually I felt quite sick. He wanted me to work for him as a spy all right, but only to ensnare my own brother. I had sensed that Liam was in danger, but I hadn’t realized how serious his situation was. And now I realized that I could never attempt to seek him out to warn him. It was all too possible that John Wilkie would have someone tailing me wherever I went and I wasn’t going to risk leading his men straight to Liam.
No wonder Liam had looked so anxious when I stopped him in the street. I tried to think how I could get word to him that the authorities were looking for him. If I couldn’t go into the Lower East S
ide myself I’d have to send someone else. The person that came immediately to mind was Sarah. Her settlement house was only a block away from where I had encountered Liam. If he was staying nearby there was a good chance she’d see him. I must somehow get a letter to her, that she could hand to Liam, warning him. But that posed another problem. I couldn’t risk going to that settlement house in case I bumped into Liam again. If only Sid and Gus were here.
I jumped as there was a knock at the front door again. Who could that be now? Maybe Mr. Wilkie regretted what he had just asked me to do and was returning to apologize. And to think that two days ago I had complained about being bored. I smoothed down my skirt and opened the front door.
Standing before me was the most welcome sight in ages.
“Molly, we’re back!” said my dear friend Augusta Walcott, usually known as Gus, as she wrapped me in a hug.
“I’m so delighted to see both of you,” I said, turning to hug my other friend, Elena Goldfarb, nicknamed Sid, in turn. “Come on in. I’ve lemonade or iced tea.”
“Just what we hoped,” Sid said. “We’re parched after that long uncomfortable train journey. We had to wait for the connection in Providence for over an hour. Some sort of trouble on the line.”
They followed me through to the kitchen and sat at my kitchen table.
“So how was Newport?” I asked as I put a kettle on the stove. “I kept thinking of you enjoying that ocean breeze.”
“The breeze was fine,” Gus said. “And the sea bathing was delightfully cool, and we went for a sail or two. Those were the good parts.”
“And the not so good?” I asked.
Sid grinned. “Nonstop social functions—croquet and tennis parties and luncheons, dinners, formal balls. Also Gus’s cousin was determined to set her up with a young man.”
“A ghastly young man,” Gus added. “He talked with a lisp and sprayed when he said his esses. And he talked about himself all the time and how wonderful he was and how brilliantly he played tennis.”
“Sounds delightful,” I said dryly.
“Oh, and he came from the best of families, as Gus’s cousin kept reminding us,” Sid said. “And when Gus told her cousin that she was quite happy in her current situation and saw no reason to change, the cousin was frightfully huffy.”
“She said that friendships such as ours were quite acceptable among young girls, before they knew the way of the world and were ready for a husband, but quite unacceptable thereafter,” Gus added with a grin at Sid.
“So we packed up and escaped,” Gus said, giving Sid a conspiratorial glance. “I don’t really know what made us accept the invitation in the first place. We knew how unbearably snobbish and conniving my cousin would be and how she’d keep trying to make a suitable match for me.”
“Hurray for your cousin. I can’t tell you how glad I am that you’re home again,” I said.
“You’ve been dying of boredom, I knew it,” Sid said. “What did I tell you, Gus. I said we should have spirited Molly with us to Newport.”
I put a plate of cookies on the table and took down the best china from the cupboard. “Until two days ago that was true,” I said. “But things have been happening thick and fast.” And all details of the letter and Sarah and the kidnapped baby came spilling out and I finished by telling them about bumping into Liam and Mr. Wilkie’s visit. I should probably have kept quiet about the latter, but I had come to rely on my friends and their good sense, and I needed to tell someone. Also I’ve never been good at holding my tongue.
“Goodness me,” Gus said. “You’ve been having far too much excitement without us.”
“I feel rather shaken up by all of it, if you want to know,” I said. “Seeing that poor woman so distraught when her child was kidnapped really upset me.”
“Well it would, given your current condition,” Gus said.
“And then running into my brother like that, only to find that the Secret Service is on the lookout for him. I really want to warn him, but I don’t see how I can risk going anywhere near him without putting him in even greater danger.” I got up as the kettle began to sing on the stove.
“Molly,” Gus said carefully, “you say your brother is in great danger and you want to warn him, but if he’s really part of some kind of anarchist plot, should you really stand in the way of the authorities and tip off these people that the Secret Service is onto them? I mean, what if they plan to assassinate the king of England or our president? I know blood is thicker than water, but…”
“I don’t want you to think that I condone anything like that. If I try and warn Liam it will be to go back to France and have nothing to do with this plot. I can’t believe he’d want to be part of something that involved innocent lives.”
I saw my friends exchange a hurried glance.
“I thought maybe I could write him a letter, telling him that he should leave the country right away. Maybe Sarah could keep an eye out for him to deliver the letter for me. I saw him on the corner of Elizabeth Street, not too far from her settlement house. But Daniel doesn’t want me going to that area. Do you think you’d be able to deliver the letter to her?”
“Of course,” Gus said.
“Better than that,” Sid said. “You can enlist us, Molly. We can scour the Lower East Side looking for your brother, can’t we, Gus.”
“I can’t ask you to do that for me,” I said quickly.
“Nonsense, we’d love to do it. You know we always jump at the chance to help you with your sleuthing.”
“Yes, I know,” I said with slight hesitation. Sid and Gus had always been keen volunteers, but the trouble was that to them life was a great and glorious game.
“Oh, come on, Molly, do say yes,” Gus said. “We’re itching to do something useful after all those days of mindless chatter and tea parties.”
“I don’t think you understand how serious this is,” I said. “The police are looking for him. If you approach him and say anything that anyone could overhear, you’re sealing his death warrant.”
Sid looked rather haughty as she said, “Molly, I think we can be trusted to show a little common sense. We are women of the world, after all. And our work with the suffrage movement has required guts and diplomacy.”
I realized this was true. They took terrible risks for the cause and had been to jail on at least one occasion. “Of course. Forgive me,” I said. “I’d be most grateful if you undertook this task for me. I’ll write the letter today.”
“What does your brother look like—do you have a photograph?”
“No, but he looks like me,” I said. “His hair is even brighter red and he’s thinner and rather gaunt looking now, but the resemblance is very strong. You’d recognize him if you saw him.”
“Well then, that’s settled,” Sid said. “You write the letter. We’ll get unpacked and sorted out and then we’ll be at your disposal.”
“You’re the tops,” I said. “I’ll never be able to repay all the kind things you’ve done for me.”
“Nonsense,” Gus said. “Our life would be awfully boring if you didn’t live across the street. We love a little spice and danger from time to time, don’t we, Sid?”
“Just a little,” Sid said.
I poured each of them a glass of iced tea and put the sugar bowl in front of them.
“Then can I also ask you to keep your eyes open for more potential kidnappings when you’re going through the Lower East Side?”
“More kidnappings? Are you expecting more?” Gus sounded shocked.
“I’m afraid so. The one I witnessed, or almost witnessed, was the fifth recently that the police know about. Daniel thinks that a gang has found taking babies an easy way of making money.”
“That’s despicable,” Sid said. “We shall certainly keep our eyes open and if we do witness one, then heaven help the kidnapper.”
“Oh, do be careful,” I said hurriedly. “These gangs are quite ruthless.”
Gus put her hand over mine. “Don�
�t worry. I’ll make sure she doesn’t do anything too daring or stupid. But I have to confess I’m a teeny bit excited about apprehending a possible kidnapper myself. Do you have any description?”
“None at all. The police have nothing to go on. I’m afraid snatching a baby is all too easy in those crowded streets.”
“We’ll just do our best then,” Gus said. “You can rely on us, Molly.”
And she saluted. I laughed. “Now I can concentrate on the other matter,” I said. “That letter about the missing Irish girl.”
“I thought you promised Daniel no more detective work.” Sid wagged a finger at me. “What does he think about this?”
“She hasn’t told him, naturally,” Gus said with a smirk at me.
“Actually I have his blessing,” I said. “At least I have his blessing to ask our friends if they have come across a family called Mainwaring, which was the name of the family where the girl from Ireland found employment.” I took a sip of my own tea, then looked up at them. “You don’t happen to have come across anyone called Mainwaring in your travels, I suppose?”
“The name doesn’t ring a bell.” Sid looked at Gus for confirmation.
Gus shook her head. “I don’t think I know anyone called Mainwaring. Did you say she lives in New York?”
“I don’t know where she lives,” I said. “I made that assumption because the girl found a job so quickly after landing here. I’m writing to employment agencies to see if any of them remember placing the girl.”
“Why don’t you just put an advertisement in the Times?” Sid said. “Wishing to contact a Mrs. Mainwaring who recently employed Maureen O’Byrne as a domestic.”
“I could do that,” I said doubtfully. “Would it be very expensive?”
“I shouldn’t think so,” Sid shrugged, money to her being no object.
Money was an object to me, but I didn’t want to admit this. “I thought of going to see Miss Van Woekem,” I said. “She knows everybody who matters.”
