Pilfered Promises

by M. Louisa Locke

  When the girls disappeared down the back corridor, Laura said to Annie, “I am sorry I upset her. I just didn’t think about the fact that she’d been working for the woman.”

  “That’s all right. You’ve been so busy between work and school, I feel like we haven’t had a chance to get caught up before now. Your brother even asked me this morning if you’d already gone to the ranch since he’d not seen you in days.”

  “Oh pooh, he knows I don’t leave until the 22rd. But tell me, how’s his divorce case going?”

  “He’s been busy getting train tickets and hotel rooms for the people who’ve agreed to testify that Mrs. Inglenook’s half-brother was perjuring himself. The investigator found a neighbor who will tell the judge that she’s heard O’Grady threaten revenge against his half-sister because his father kicked him out of the house for abusing her. The other two witnesses are men who were with O’Grady when he got a letter from Mr. Inglenook’s lawyer, a month ago, asking if he would testify against his sister in a divorce trial. Not only did this confirm that the lawyer was not telling the truth about when and how he’d heard from O’Grady, but these two men say they helped O’Grady concoct the story about Mrs. Inglenook and a lover.”

  “Heavens, why would they admit to that?”

  “Seems O’Grady promised them a cut of the money that Mr. Inglenook sent him as the down payment for coming and testifying. And he’d skipped town without giving them their cut.”

  Laura laughed. “Oh my, they don’t sound exactly like the most upstanding citizens.”

  “No, but Nate says what they have to say corroborates the testimony of the landlord, who is a much more respectable individual. He hopes this will be enough to convince the judge to ignore O’Grady’s testimony when he makes his decision about whether to grant Mrs. Inglenook a divorce.”

  Beatrice, who’d been kneading the dough for the morning rolls, came over with the old brown teapot, pouring each of them a fresh cup. She said, “Annie dear, I’m about to serve Miss Laura her dinner. Can I slice you some of the ham? You didn’t eat much earlier. Are you feeling all right?”

  “No, Beatrice. This tea will be just fine.” Annie took a breath, knowing she’d sounded snappish.

  It was just that she was so tired of all her well-meaning friends trying to determine if she was with child yet. Thank goodness Esther Stein had left right after Thanksgiving to spend the weeks until Christmas with her husband up in Portland––where their son’s wife was about to give birth. Gave her a reprieve from listening to Esther go on and on about how wonderful it was going to be to have a little baby in the boarding house. Annie had finally reminded her that every time Esther came back from helping take care of one of her grandchildren, she’d say how glad she was not to have to listen to a baby crying at night any more. And the Steins’ suite of rooms was right across from Annie and Nate’s room, where any child of theirs would be sleeping, and crying, at least until he or she was weaned.

  And heaven knew what they were going to do when they needed a separate room for the child. Throw out the boarders, Chapman and Harvey? She had mentioned this potential problem to Beatrice, who’d just said that “…things would work out, but that she needed to relax and let nature take its course.”

  Annie sighed. She knew everyone meant well. “Bea, I will take up some cookies for us when I go up. Nate’s always a bit peckish at night.”

  “He’s always a bit peckish when it comes to oatmeal cookies,” said Laura. “Oh, Mrs. O’Rourke, Kathleen told me you were going to start doing your Christmas baking this weekend. Kitty’s coming over after church on Sunday to study, but we’d love to help out on our breaks.”

  “Of course, dearie. I can always use extra hands in the kitchen.”

  Annie smiled, knowing that even though Laura and her friend would probably make the whole process harder for Beatrice, the older woman was genuine in her delight at the idea of having them help out. Just one of the many reasons Annie couldn’t stay mad at her.

  “Here she is! Doesn’t she look grand!” crowed Kathleen, pushing a blushing Biddy into the kitchen.

  The severe lines and rich sheen of Annie’s old black silk somehow transformed the red-haired Bridget from an awkward girl into a beautiful woman.

  “Oh my, Bridget. Your own mother wouldn’t know you,” Beatrice said fondly, going over and straightening the girl’s lace collar. “And those snooty clerks you’ll be working alongside won’t be able to say a thing.”

  Biddy laughed her full-throated laugh. “Oh, they’ll have plenty to say. But I don’t mind them. ’Sides, who I need to please is the managers I’ll be working for, Mr. Jenkins, Miss Bischoff, and Mrs. Martell. You think they’ll approve?”

  “Absolutely,” said Annie.

  “And so will the male customers,” added Laura. “And that’s what will put the noses of the other female clerks out of joint.”

  “Oh Miss, you’re funning me. Anyways, most of the clerks on the first floor are male, and on the second floor most of the female clerks are real stunners…so I can’t imagine they’ll worry much about me.”

  Annie had finally gotten a chance to ask Mr. Jenkins, the first floor manager, if he’d had any problems with the manufacturers he bought his dry goods from with missing deliveries or inferior goods. He said he hadn’t, but he didn’t always use the same sources for cloth as the ready-made department did.

  During that meeting she’d brought up the possibility of hiring Biddy, since she knew the police already had informed him of their suspicions about one of his cash girls being involved in a shoplifting scheme. He’d hemmed and hawed a bit, but she was able to convince him that the sooner Cherry could either be cleared of any wrong-doing or be caught, the sooner he could go back to concentrating on making this the best holiday sales season ever for his department. So he’d agreed.

  Miss Bischoff, who ran the second floor department that sold such disparate items as corsets, watches, perfumes, and women’s and children’s shoes, had been too glad to get the extra help to question why Mr. Villeneuve was sending her and Mrs. Martell, the other second floor manager, a young seamstress as a clerk. So Biddy would start work in notions on the first floor on Thursday and Friday and wherever she was needed on the second floor on Saturday.

  Annie was glad the dress looked so good, since clerks generally came from backgrounds that gave them a little more polish and social ease than Biddy’s poor Irish family had given her. But the one thing the girl did seem to have in abundance was courage, so Annie believed she’d be fine.

  After being made much over, Biddy went back with Kathleen to change into her regular clothes. While Laura started eating her dinner, Annie asked her a few questions about her classes and they discussed what each of them was planning on getting Nate for Christmas.

  Eating the last bite of her potatoes, Laura said, “On Saturday, Kitty and I are going to try to get all our shopping done…because starting next week we will be working day and night finishing up our essays and getting a jump on preparing for the exams, which are right after the Christmas break. So if there is anything you want me to get, let me know.”

  “Thank you, dear, but I’ve rather enjoyed doing a little shopping each time I have to go to the Silver Strike. Do be sure to come see the bear I got for little Frankie before I wrap him up.”

  “I thought I would ask Kathleen to accompany us. She mentioned she needed to get some Christmas shopping done, and Kitty’s father always fusses when Kitty goes out in public without her own maid, who she doesn’t much like. This way she can leave her behind.”

  “Of course. Will be a nice treat for Kathleen, and I know she’ll love having an excuse to shop in the Silver Strike, after hearing so much about the store.”

  Laura said, “In the afternoon, Seth and Nate’s friend Mitchell are going to rent a wagon to take us in the hills to cut down a tree for the boarding house. Beatrice says there are boxes up in the attic store room with all the ornaments from your aunt and uncle’s day th
at we can use to decorate. I hope you don’t mind.”

  “Not at all. I haven’t had a good old-fashioned tree…in forever. But I wasn’t sure when either I or Nate would find the time to get one. Do ask Jamie to help you when you start to decorate the tree.”

  “Ma’am,” Biddy, back to her plain dark blue wool, said, “thanks so much for the dress, but you must let me pay you back out of my earnings. And will you please give the Misses Moffet my thank you for how quickly they got it ready?”

  “Now, Biddy, the dress is a necessary expense for furthering my investigations, and I will be including it in my final bill to Mr. Livingston. Who, if you can solve the mystery of why the shoplifting in those two departments has increased, will owe you more than the price of altering a dress. And the Moffets were quite delighted to help out.”

  “Well, they are ever so kind. The sister who doesn’t talk has understanding eyes, and the other one, well she just chattered away while she took my measurements, made me feel so at ease. Tilly just loves them.”

  Annie smiled at Biddy’s description of the silent Miss Millie and the loquacious Miss Minnie, and she said, “They seem to have taken the death of Mrs. Fournier, as a fellow dress designer, quite personally. I was able to convince them to come with me next week to tour the dressmaking department. I am hoping they can help me determine if the inferior material is all coming from the same manufacturers.”

  “Oh, ma’am, please have them stop by and say hello.” Biddy started to say something else, then stopped.

  “What is it, Biddy?”

  “You see, ma’am. Kathleen told me tonight that Monsieur and Madame Villeneuve are planning to adopt Emmaline. And she thinks that this might mean that Monsieur is really Emmaline’s father. And that he might be the one who bought the shop for her…or he might have been the one who gave her money to pay off the loan you all were talking about. Do you think that could be true?”

  Annie knew that Biddy quite liked the charming Frenchman and would hate to think ill of him. She said, “It is true that Monsieur and Madame Villeneuve would like to adopt Emmaline. But I don’t think it is possible that he is Emmaline’s father or the person who helped her buy the shop. My information is that he and Madame didn’t come to San Francisco until 1871. And Marie Fournier already had her daughter and her shop by that date. However, it is possible that he was the one who helped her pay off the bank loan, just as he was the one who helped her get the job at the Silver Strike.”

  “But that doesn’t mean he killed her,” Biddy said. “Like Miss Laura said, why give her money and then kill her?”

  “Quite right. And we don’t know if the money for the loan had anything to do with the murder. It is just a suspicious coincidence. Just like we don’t know for sure that there wasn’t really a Captain Fournier. It is just the lack of any evidence of his existence that is suspicious.”

  “But if this Frenchman isn’t the man who Miss Spencer said visited Madam Fournier and had Emmaline call ‘uncle,’ who was he?” asked Kathleen.

  “We don’t know. All we know is that someone gave her the money for the shop, and while we can’t be sure, it looks very likely that that person also forged her signature to get a loan with the shop as collateral before he died.”

  Laura said, “Oh, you didn’t tell us that part. Someone forged her signature? And then died, leaving her in a mess?”

  “Yes,” said Annie, “that’s what we think happened. We are only assuming the man died because Marie told Miss Spencer he did. And just about that time the loan payments stopped. But all of this might be immaterial to my investigation into the thefts or the murder. Because as far as we know, in 1870 when Marie got the money for the shop and this person was visiting her, she didn’t have any involvement with anyone related to the Silver Strike.”

  “Why are you sure the man died?” Laura said. “Maybe he just threw Mrs. Fournier over. He could have been married and his wife found out about her. Or maybe he just got tired of her. She could have said he died to explain to her daughter why this man stopped coming around.”

  All of a sudden, Annie felt disoriented, almost faint. Why hadn’t she thought of that alternative? She shook her head to clear it and said, “Laura, that could be true. And, if that’s the case, this mystery man could also have been the one who gave her the money to pay off the loan. Maybe they started their relationship back up again.”

  “Her room certainly looked like she’d recently been seeing some man,” Kathleen added. “Looked like a proper love nest, the kind they write about in the papers. And with the shop closed Saturday and Sunday morning, well they would have privacy, wouldn’t they?”

  “And what would the likes of you know about such things, young lady,” Beatrice said, shaking her finger at the girl. “Not proper conversation for my kitchen.”

  “I’m sorry, Mrs. O’Rourke,” Kathleen said, blushing.

  Annie jumped in and said, “That’s my fault, Beatrice. I’m the one who introduced the subject. The truth is that it did look like Mrs. Fournier was entertaining someone in her room at her old shop.”

  Biddy, who’d been silent throughout this discussion, spoke up and said, “Mighten it be she was seeing someone from the Silver Strike? I mean, not Monsieur Villeneuve, because he’s that taken with his wife. But why not someone else like that Mr. Brown who runs the book shop or Mr. Livingston’s son. They are both ever so handsome.”

  Laura said, “Why, Biddy, I thought we needed to worry about the customers. Looks like you have your cap set on one of the managers.”

  “Now, don’t tease Biddy,” said Annie. “But she’s correct. Much as it is tempting to get caught up with the question of who bought the shop or forged the loan document, there is the more important question of whether that person has anything to do with the thefts at the Silver Strike or her murder.”

  “I didn’t mean to suggest Mr. Brown was involved in anything, ma’am. The girls who work for him say he’s very nice.”

  “I know you didn’t mean to accuse him of anything, Biddy. And I agree with you…I have trouble seeing Mr. Brown as the villain in this case. Or Robbie Livingston, for that matter, because why would he steal from the business that supports him? But then who else? I suppose we shouldn’t even rule out the older managers, Mr. Jenkins or Mr. Gower being her lover.”

  Annie saw Biddy smile, which was her purpose in suggesting these two unlikely men as possible suspects, but then she went on to say, “If Marie was having an affair with one of the clerks, she might be keeping it secret. But then they don’t make enough to have the money to loan to her. Same with the porters or any of the staff down in receiving.”

  “Unless they had money to pay off the loan because they are involved in the thefts,” Laura piped up.

  “Oh that’s clever,” Annie said. “The motivation for one of the men at the store stealing could be to get the money to help out Mrs. Fournier because they were in love with her.”

  “But then we get back to what Miss Laura said, why kill her?” Kathleen frowned, then she said excitedly, “Could it be that there was a man who got involved with something shady at the store…so’s he could help her pay off her loan? And he had a partner. Someone like one of the delivery men that Patrick keeps talking about. Then maybe the partner was the one who decided Mrs. Fournier knew too much and had to be killed.”

  Chapter 19

  “GOLDEN RULE BAZAAR—Holiday Gifts.”––San Francisco Chronicle December 10, 1880

  Early Saturday morning, December 11, 1880

  “Can I pop in for a minute?” Nate’s sister Laura said, standing at the bedroom door. “I wanted to ask you for some suggestions about what to buy everyone at the ranch before I go shopping this morning. We hope to be there when the store opens at 8 o’clock.”

  He was going to have to start locking the darned door if he wanted any privacy. At least the maid Kathleen was considerate enough to knock loudly and wait patiently for one or the other of them to tell her to enter. Or maybe she
was just a little more knowledgeable about what might be going on behind that closed door than his innocent sister, Laura. At least he hoped she was innocent.

  “Certainly,” Annie answered brightly as she buttoned up the front of her top where his hands had been a moment before. “Your brother mentioned this morning that he’d be glad to go in with you on something for your parents or Billy and Violet.”

  “Nate, that’d be wonderful. I will keep that in mind. Annie, do you think it would be all right if I saw something Kathleen liked to offer to buy it for her Christmas present? I was thinking a new hat.”

  “I think that’s a splendid idea. You know Nate and I have commissioned a new dress for her from the Moffets, and since she’s already picked out the material, maybe you can find something that will match her new outfit.”

  “Can you believe how different Biddy looked in your dress? Nate, did Annie tell you?”

  “Yes, and I even got to see her in all her glory on Friday when I met Annie for lunch at the Silver Strike.”

  His sister went over to the table that held their breakfast remains and said, “Mind if I finish up the bacon?” Without bothering to wait for an answer, she said, “Annie, have you learned anything new since we talked Wednesday night?”

  “I was just telling your brother that the next afternoon I finally got the time to go and visit Miss Voss. You’ve never met her, Laura, but she’s this redoubtable older woman who runs one of the most successful furniture companies in town. I thought she might be able to tell me if there were any delivery companies that could be involved in stealing the inventory that has gone missing from the home furnishings department.”