Words Spoken True: A Novel

by Ann H. Gabhart

  © 2012 by Ann H. Gabhart

  Published by Revell

  a division of Baker Publishing Group

  P.O. Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287

  www.revellbooks.com

  Ebook edition created 2012

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

  ISBN 978-1-4412-3598-5

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.

  Scripture quotations are from the King James Version of the Bible.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Published in association with the Books & Such Literary Agency, 52 Mission Circle, Suite 122, PMB 170, Santa Rosa, CA 95409-7953.

  “I’ve come to expect wonderful books from Ann Gabhart, and her latest historical romance, Words Spoken True, doesn’t disappoint. In this novel, Ms. Gabhart gives readers a peek into the lives of two news reporters—one a man and one a woman—both intent upon creating the best newspaper in Louisville, Kentucky. Amid unsolved murders, riots, and adversity, the ability to trust each other and trust God is put to the test. Ms. Gabhart weaves a story that is a page turner from beginning to end. This is one you’ll highly recommend to friends.”

  —Judith Miller, author, Daughters of Amana series

  Praise for Angel Sister:

  “What a jewel of a story. Reminded me of To Kill a Mockingbird. Like a Kentucky summer, Angel Sister starts slow and easy but by the end, roars along, leaving the reader breathless and wanting more. ”

  —Lauraine Snelling, author, Red River series, Daughters of Blessing, and One Perfect Day

  “This book will leave you changed as it uncovers family secrets and draws you into the days following the first World War and the Great Depression. It will astound you how the characters persevere while making difficult decisions amidst heartache, and their determination to make it through the toughest of hard times.”

  —RT Book Reviews

  “An amazing reminder of how we lean on our own strength and understanding—and then are surprised at our inability to overcome obstacles.”

  —CBA Retailers + Resources

  “Angel Sister paints an inspirational portrait of forgiveness and grace in the midst of trial and hardship. . . . It reveals how forgiveness brings freedom, not so much for the one forgiven as for the one doing the forgiving. Two major strengths to Ann Gabhart’s writing include her deeply textured characters and rich atmosphere. She moves the plot forward by weaving the past with the present. . . . There are many levels to this deftly written novel.”

  —Crosswalk.com

  “Gabhart is one of the best Christian-oriented historical fiction authors writing today. Her characters have depth, her plots are complex, and there are no easy answers. Praying does not always work, at least not in obvious ways, and her characters struggle with their faith the way any sane person would when confronted with war, alcoholism, abuse, and abandonment. Angel Sister is the beautiful, sometimes difficult, story of a family using love, faith, and forgiveness to hold itself together.”

  —Historical Novel Review

  To my readers who have followed my story trail

  from Hollyhill

  to Harmony Hill

  to Rosey Corner

  and now . . . Louisville

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Endorsements

  Dedication

  Historical Note from the Author

  1 2 3 4 5

  6 7 8 9 10

  11 12 13 14 15

  16 17 18 19 20

  21 22 23 24 25

  26 27 28 29 30

  31 32 33

  Author’s Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Books by Ann H. Gabhart

  Back Ads

  Back Cover

  Historical Note from the Author

  In 1850, Louisville, Kentucky, was the tenth largest city in the United States. Its population had been swelled by immigrants from Germany and Ireland after the failed German revolution and the Irish potato famine. Many of these immigrants were of the Catholic faith, and the predominantly Protestant white population in Louisville began to fear their influence in the political arena. The decline of the Whig Party allowed a new power, the American Party, to enter the national political arena in 1854. The American Party was commonly known as the “Know Nothing” party because its secretive members often answered questions with “I know nothing.” By 1855, the Know Nothings could count fifty thousand voters in Kentucky. The party supported limiting immigration, allowing only native-born Americans to be elected to political office, and strictly curbing the alleged influence of the Roman Catholic Church.

  Prior to the invention of radio and television, newspapers were how people kept up with what was happening in their cities and country. Newspapers grew by leaps and bounds in the 1800s. In 1855, Louisville had at least four daily papers and several weekly papers as well. Many of the editors of these papers had agendas. They picked sides on the hot issues of the day and churned out papers full of stories and fiery opinion pieces to support their positions. Editors with disparate viewpoints dueled in words and on occasion with pistols. Editorials were often written with the intent to inflame the populace and goad the people into action. After the election riots of 1855, many placed some of the blame for the civil disorder at the door of newspapers. At least twenty-two people were killed in these riots in Louisville on August 6, 1855, a day that came to be known as Bloody Monday.

  While the actions of my characters are completely fictional, the political unrest of the day and the riot scene I dropped them into was entirely too true. We can’t hide from history—what happened, happened—but we can hope examining our past will make us wiser as we face our future.

  1

  March 1855

  Adriane Darcy’s heart pounded as the darkness settled down around her like a heavy blanket. Her eyes were open. Open as wide as she could stretch them, but she could see nothing. The dark was claiming her. She wanted to fight it, but what good would it do? The dark always won. Better to sit quiet as a mouse and accept her punishment. That’s what her stepmother told her when she pushed her inside the closet under the stairs and slammed shut the door.

  Forcing her hand up through the thick black air, Adriane dreaded the feel of the rough inside corners of the closet door. She tried not to make any noise, but something rattled the door. She jerked her arm back and was suddenly fully awake.

  It was only a dream. Adriane kicked free of the bedcovers and sat up to fumble for a candle. She needed light.

  She gripped the waxy candle but stayed her other hand before she could feel for one of the newfangled matchsticks. She thought of the welcome flare of light the match would bring, but she tightened her jaw and turned loose of the candle. She was no longer a cowering child trapped in dark fear, waiting for the moment light would spill into the closet when her father came to rescue her. She needed no rescue now.

  She pulled in a deep breath and blew it out slowly. Familiar shapes began to emerge from the night shadows—the chest with the blue pitcher and basin on top, her small writing desk piled with books and papers, and her wardrobe with the door a bit ajar.

  The panic of the dream receded, a
nd she was settling back on her pillow when something clattered against her window. That was the sound in her dream.

  Adriane popped up in bed again and stared at the window. For one crazy moment she thought it might be Stanley Jimson come to propose to her in some foolishly romantic way. He certainly needed to do something to make amends to her after totally deserting her at last night’s social, not to mention asking her father for her hand in marriage without one word to her first.

  Not that she wanted to marry Stanley Jimson. She certainly did not. She had yet to meet the man she wished to marry, or more troublesome—her father was wont to say—the man who wished to marry her. Now it appeared there was such a man. Her father had scarcely been able to contain his joy and relief while telling Adriane about her marriage-to-be the night before as if she had no choice in the matter. As if she’d be as happy about it as he so obviously was. After all, Stanley was from one of the most prominent families in Louisville. It was rumored Stan’s father, Coleman Jimson, planned to run for state senator in the August election, and money was certainly not an issue.

  “What more could any girl want?” Adriane’s father asked her.

  “A proposal might be nice,” Adriane shot back.

  Now Adriane grabbed her wrapper and smoothed her dark hair back into some reasonable order before she pushed up the second-story window and peered down at the street.

  All thoughts of Stanley Jimson vanished from her mind when she saw Duff Egan getting ready to pitch another pebble toward her window.

  The young Irish boy stopped his windup and called softly, “Miss Adriane, they found another body. You told me to be letting you know soon’s I heard.”

  “The river slasher?” Adriane kept her voice low, not much more than a whisper.

  “The same.”

  “Wait there. I’ll be right down.”

  Adriane eased the window closed to keep from waking her father. He’d never allow her out on the streets this time of night for any reason, much less to go to a murder scene. It would be shockingly improper.

  In fact her father had denounced the very stories about the murdered Irish girls as somewhat scandalous and not something a respectable newspaper should print. Of course, he did print the stories. A lot of readers liked scandalous, as the Herald and its new editor, Blake Garrett, had proven well enough over the last several months. The Herald’s headline scoops on the murders were pushing up its circulation numbers until it was actually beginning to rival the Tribune’s numbers. Her father’s paper, their paper, had been the leading newspaper in Louisville for over a decade. She planned to keep it that way in spite of the winds of change sweeping through the city.

  While her father kept battling against the Herald in his editorials, Adriane thought the real war would be won or lost in the headlines. So she’d had Duff on the lookout ever since the last girl was murdered down in Shippingport.

  Adriane yanked on a pair of her father’s old trousers and a shirt she had stashed in the bottom of her wardrobe for just this purpose. With a few deft twists, she pinned her thick dark hair flat against her head.

  The clock struck two as she slipped out of her room and made her way down the stairs, doing her best to avoid the squeaky boards. Halfway down she caught the acrid smell of ink from the freshly printed editions of the Tribune stacked in the pressroom waiting for morning delivery. Soon people all over Louisville would be opening up the Tribune to find out the news for March 22, 1855.

  Adriane could almost hear the rustling papers and see the expressions on the faces of the people reading her and her father’s words. The familiar thrill Beck said all good newspapermen felt when they put a new issue on the streets pushed through her.

  At the thought of Beck, Adriane held her breath and stepped even more gingerly on the stairs. Beck, her father’s right-hand pressman since before Adriane could remember, slept in a small room just off the pressroom. He would tie her to a chair before he’d let her out of the building to chase after a story about a murdered Irish girl. Dear Beck. Like a favored, fond uncle, he’d probably sent up a thousand prayers while he worried over her and did his best to protect her. Mostly from herself.

  In the front hallway, she grabbed a hat and jacket off the rack and slipped silently out the front door.

  “Miss Adriane, is that you?” Duff appeared out of the shadows beside the front stoop, the whites of his eyes shining as he took in her getup.

  “None other,” Adriane said. “I’m ready to go.”

  “Could be you shouldn’t ought to be going down to the river with me. It won’t be no place for a lady.” Even in the dim light she could see his troubled frown.

  “You’re right, Duff, but I won’t be a lady. I’ll be just one of the fellows.”

  “Folks ain’t always that easy to fool.” Duff gave her a hard look. “You may have on breeches, but you have some to learn about how a feller walks.”

  “Then give me a lesson.”

  “You have to be throwing your legs out free and easy without worrying about no ruffled petticoats and such.” He walked away from her with a swagger.

  Adriane stifled a laugh as she followed after him, copying his stride.

  “Not bad,” Duff said. “But ye’d best keep to the shadows and let me do any talking that needs to be done. There be some things loose clothes can’t hide.”

  “Right,” Adriane agreed as the boy turned to lead the way down the street.

  Ever since Duff had shown up on the Tribune’s doorstep begging a job several months ago, he’d been more like a little brother to her than a regular hand. It had taken some doing for Adriane to convince her father to take the boy on since Duff was only twelve and, even worse, one of the Irish immigrants her father railed against in his editorials. Her father worried the rapid increase in the city’s immigrant population was going to bring them all to ruin. He believed some privileges, such as running for elected office, should be reserved for men born in America. Immigrants excluded.

  Adriane didn’t always agree with her father’s politics, but nobody cared what she, a woman, thought. Women were excluded right along with the immigrant population. Women weren’t even supposed to bother their heads over such issues. Too much thinking on serious matters was reputed to be injurious to the female brain. Nor were women supposed to go chasing after stories on the wrong side of town in the middle of the night. Her father would be furious if he found out. She took another look back at the building that housed the Tribune offices and their home. No signs of anybody stirring.

  With a breath of relief, she hurried after Duff toward the riverfront. Beyond the pools of light from the gas streetlamps, the black night lurked and put out fingers of darkness to claim her. Her heart pounded up in her throat, but she told herself it was only the dream remnants bothering her.

  She hadn’t had one of those nightmares for years. Her stepmother, Henrietta, was long dead, and no one locked Adriane in dark places anymore. Nothing in the night was threatening her. She was only chasing after a story. That by itself was enough to make her heart beat faster. With excitement. Not fear.

  In front of her, Duff slowed and edged closer to the buildings. He grabbed her arm to pull her back beside him before he pointed ahead to where men were milling about in the street.

  “Don’t be getting too close to any of the watch,” he warned her in a whisper. “They favor booting you toward home if they get half a chance.”

  Adriane moved when Duff moved, melted into the shadows when he stopped as they crept closer to the scene. The quarter moon slipped out from behind the clouds to reflect a bit of light off the river beyond them and give the night an eerie gray look in spite of the streetlamps. It was far too easy to imagine the poor murdered girl’s ghost in the misty shadows.

  A shiver walked through Adriane as her eyes fastened on a grimy blanket covering what had to be the body. All at once, it wasn’t just a story for the Tribune she was trying to beat the Herald to, but a real girl who wouldn’t awaken when the
sun came up to go about her life as she should.

  “Did you know her?” Adriane whispered in Duff’s ear.

  “No, but one of me sisters did. Kathleen O’Dell’s her name. She worked down at the Lucky Leaf. The story I heard said she left early last night, but didn’t give no reason why. Nobody saw her after that.”

  “Nobody but the murderer.” Adriane’s eyes were fixed on the body. At the sound of footsteps on the walkway, Duff jerked her back into a dark doorway as a man in a rumpled suit hurried past them.

  The man spoke to a few of the policemen before he slowly approached the body. He stared down at the covered shape as though gathering his nerve before he knelt down to lift an edge of the blanket. After a long moment, he very carefully let the cover drop back down over the body.

  Without proper thought, Adriane stepped out of the doorway to get a better look at the man’s face. He might be the girl’s father or perhaps a brother. As if the man felt her eyes on him, he stood up and looked directly toward her. The terrible anger on his face made Adriane catch her breath.

  Duff grabbed her arm again and pointed in the other direction toward one of the watch. “It looks like Officer Jefferson has spotted us, Miss Adriane.” His whisper in her ear was urgent. “We’d best make a run for it. Now.”

  A large man in uniform was heading their way, swinging his truncheon menacingly as he yelled, “Hey, you two, get on out of here. This ain’t no entertainment feature.”