Bride of the High Country

by Kaki Warner

  “Someone from her past. A horrible man.” Mrs. Throckmorton sighed and shook her head. “If she wants you to know more, she’ll tell you. Who sent him after her?”

  “That’s one of the things I’m here to find out.” Tait felt like he was stumbling around a snake pit in the dark. First Lucinda, and now Mrs. Throckmorton. Why wouldn’t they answer his questions? “How can I keep her safe if you won’t tell me who’s a threat to her and why?”

  “Dear boy, I would if I could.” Tears shimmered in the pale blue eyes. “But I cannot. I promised her I would never speak of it.”

  Seeing that Mrs. Throckmorton was becoming more agitated, Tait struggled to curb his frustration. What in the hell could have happened in that fire? Lucinda had been little more than a child fifteen years ago, yet it haunted her still.

  An abrupt knock announced Pringle’s return. Conversation ceased as the old man entered, bearing a silver tray upon which sat a cup and saucer, a steaming teapot, a cut glass tumbler, and a half-filled bottle of amber liquid. In silence they watched his shuffling progress across to the table beside the fireplace, where he set down the tray and with great ceremony poured out the tea and whiskey, then presented them with a flourish to Mrs. Throckmorton and Tait.

  Tait doubted the tea was even warm anymore.

  “If that will be all, madam?”

  “For now.” She waved him toward the door. “And no more eavesdropping, Pringle. I would hate to have to put you on the street at your age.”

  “Thank you, madam.” With a sniff, the old man sidled out, closing the door with a resounding thump to show what he thought of her threats.

  “Cantankerous old fool,” Mrs. Throckmorton muttered.

  Tait took a swallow and almost choked on cheap rye whiskey instead of the expected Scotch. Old fool, indeed.

  “How could you have left her with that horrid man skulking about?” Mrs. Throckmorton accused, picking up the conversation where it had left off. “You said you cared about her.”

  “I didn’t leave her,” Tait said wearily as he set aside his glass. “Smythe pushed me off the train.”

  He told her about Smythe’s attack on Lucinda in the alley, and his later assault on Tait in the Parlor Car. “He said he’d been sent to silence her. Because I was in the way, he intended to kill me, too. When he tried to push me over the railing at the back of the train, I took him with me. That’s the only way I could think of to protect her.”

  “Mercy. It’s a wonder you survived.”

  “I almost didn’t.” He described the fall down the slope, hearing Smythe scream, then waking up at the Yoder farm three days later. “They said they saw no one else on the slope. But I don’t see how Smythe could have survived.”

  “Margaret’s wire mentioned none of this.”

  “She didn’t know.” Which troubled Tait almost as much as Smythe’s disappearance. What was Lucinda thinking? That he had deserted her? Just walked off the train without looking back? But what else would she think after the things he’d said.

  “So what do you intend to do?”

  At least that part was clear to him. “Stop Doyle from pursuing her further. Then find out who sent Smythe.” And do what he must to stop him.

  “You’re that certain your Irish friend didn’t send him?”

  “Doyle? I don’t think so. At least I hope not.”

  She made a derisive sound. “I don’t know how you can associate with such an underhanded man. He was never going to be worthy of my Margaret. He would have made her life miserable.”

  “Is that why you convinced her to go along with your plan?”

  That evasive look again. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Don’t you?” He’d known it all along. It had just been easier to believe it was clever Lucinda’s doing rather than this duplicitous old lady. “It was all your idea, wasn’t it? Faking the illness, the widow’s disguise, taking the certificates and marriage license.”

  “Marriage license? I know nothing about that.”

  Tait noticed she didn’t deny the rest of it. He wondered again how he could have been so blind. “She still has it. It was never witnessed or registered, which means they’re not legally married.”

  A tremulous smile lit the wrinkled face. “So Kerrigan has no hold over her?”

  “Not legally. At least as far as the marriage goes. But the stock certificates are a different matter. Look, Mrs. Throckmorton.” Tait leaned forward again, determined to get answers from her before it was too late. “I know Lucinda is Irish. I know what happened to her parents, and that when she learned Doyle was a runner like the one who destroyed her family, she felt she had to leave.”

  “She told you that?”

  He nodded.

  “Then you also know what kind of vile person your friend must be to do that to his own kind. So how can you be so sure he didn’t send Smythe after her?”

  “Because he cares less about Lucinda than he does his stock certificates. And he won’t get them back if he kills her.” Just saying the words aloud made him half sick.

  Fresh tears clouded Mrs. Throckmorton’s eyes. “I am the one who put them in her traveling case. If I hadn’t—”

  “It wouldn’t have mattered,” he cut in. “Smythe wasn’t sent to retrieve the stock certificates. He was sent to silence Lucinda.”

  “By whom? And what could she possibly know?”

  He shrugged. “Maybe it’s something she saw or heard fifteen years ago when she last saw Smythe. Or maybe she knows who set the fire. But if you won’t tell me about her past, I don’t know how I can help her.”

  “Oh, dear.” Fresh tears fell. She plucked at a handkerchief in her lap.

  Tait could see she was caught in a dilemma she couldn’t resolve, but he didn’t care. He would do whatever was necessary to protect Lucinda. He owed her that after what he’d accused her of. Reaching over, he rested a hand on the restless fingers. “Please talk to me, Mrs. Throckmorton. Help me before it’s too late.”

  She took a hitching breath and hiked her chin. “I would if I could, Mr. Rylander. I gave her my word I wouldn’t. But go ask the Papist. Father O’Rourke was there. He saw it all.”

  * * *

  By the time Tait left the brownstone, it was too late to hunt up either Father O’Rourke or a doctor, so he went directly to Doyle’s townhome.

  It was lit up as if a party were in progress, although the rooms behind the open drapes looked empty of revelers and only one carriage sat parked in the street. Tait knew Doyle didn’t like darkened rooms—a legacy of the horrific crossing from Ireland, when rats would come out at night to feast on the fevered flesh of the starving immigrants stuffed like cordwood in the dark, dank hold of the overcrowded ship. Even now, Doyle’s fear of vermin was so strong he wouldn’t even venture near the docks after dark.

  Tait told the coachman to wait, then hobbled up the steps to the front door.

  Buster Quinn—a retired Pinkerton detective hired by Doyle just before Margaret left, and who served more as a security advisor than a butler—opened it to Tait’s knock.

  “Good evening, Mr. Rylander. Welcome back.” Then he saw Tait’s face and the crutch, and his smile faltered. “Come in, sir.”

  Tait hobbled over the threshold. “I saw the carriage outside. Company?”

  “Only Mr. Horne, sir. I’ll get Mr. Kerrigan.”

  “Thanks, Quinn.”

  Before Tait had hung his bowler on the hall tree, he heard brisk footsteps coming down the hall.

  “Dia duit, my friend,” Doyle called out as he crossed the marble foyer. But like Quinn’s, his smile faded when he saw Tait’s battered condition. “I’d like to see the other fellow, so I would. Jasus, boyo. What happened?”

  “Long story.”

  Doyle looked arou
nd. “Where’s Margaret? Your wire said you were bringing her back.”

  “I intended to.” Unwilling to show his hand before he found out who had hired Smythe, Tait gave a shorter version of what he’d told Mrs. Throckmorton, saying only that a man had attempted to rob him and in the ensuing struggle, they had both fallen off the train. He didn’t mention names . . . either Smythe’s or the new one Lucinda was using.

  “Will you be all right?”

  “Eventually.”

  “And Margaret? Was she involved in this?”

  “No. She was on another car at the time.”

  “So where is she?”

  Tait shrugged. “She could be anywhere by now. I was laid up for a week on an Amish farm before I was well enough to travel.”

  “Faith!” Doyle cut loose several Irish curses as he paced the foyer. “If I ever get my hands on that—”

  “Forget it, Doyle,” Tait cut in before the Irishman’s temper got away from him. “You don’t need her. Just get an annulment and let her go.”

  Doyle threw his hands up in disgust. “It’s not her I want, Tait. It’s the damned certificates. The vote is fast approaching.”

  “What vote?” a voice interrupted.

  Doyle muttered something in Gaelic.

  Tait turned to see Franklin Horne coming toward them. He tried to hide his distaste. There was something unsavory about the man. Almost reptilian, with that darting tongue and those small, close-set eyes that never seemed to blink. “Evening, Horne.”

  In a show of camaraderie, Doyle clapped an arm around Tait’s shoulder. The smell of alcohol was strong on his breath. Drinking and sharing confidences with Franklin Horne—a bad combination, in Tait’s view.

  “Tait fell off a train, Frank. Can you imagine anyone being that clumsy?”

  Horne studied Tait, those eyes bright with speculation. “Train where?”

  “Near Pittsburgh.” Tait watched to see if the other man showed any reaction, but Horne’s expression didn’t change.

  “Horne, here,” Doyle went on in a jovial voice, “has plans to be our next governor. Be nice having a friend in Albany to cover our backs, don’t you think, Tait?”

  The last person Tait wanted covering his back was Franklin Horne.

  Taking his arm from Tait’s shoulder, Doyle motioned toward the rear of the house. “Let’s go back to my office for a drink and we’ll discuss how best we can help each other.”

  Tait shook his head. “Perhaps another day. I haven’t even been home yet. Just wanted to tell you I’m back.” With a nod to Horne, he told Doyle he’d be by in a day or two, and returned to his waiting cab.

  * * *

  Tait’s own townhome was in an older but still fashionable area of the city, and was smaller and less showy than Doyle’s sprawling mansion. Situated in a row of similar homes on a quiet street lined with trees, it had a solid, almost staid feel to it, due in part, because Tait had furnished it more for comfort than show, and also because most of his neighbors were older.

  Insomuch as his various investments and board positions took up most of his evenings—and when he was home, Tait preferred privacy and quiet—he didn’t often entertain large groups, but restricted his gatherings to a few close friends in for dinner from time to time. Thus, he didn’t require a large staff, and his simple needs were easily met by Elder and Ceily Rice, an older Negro couple he’d found sitting on the steps of a nearby church three years ago.

  Both had been house slaves. But like thousands of other freed men and women who had fled the South hoping for a better life up north, they had found even less opportunity awaiting them above the Mason-Dixon Line. They had eagerly taken up Tait’s offer to manage the house he had recently bought. It was an amiable arrangement that had worked out well for all of them. And through the years, as sometimes happens between people torn from places they’ve known all their lives and thrust into unfamiliar surroundings, a bond had formed between Tait and the Rices that transcended skin color or background or education. Perhaps it was the sound of the south in their speech or the love of common regional foods or the shared memories of things found only in the place they’d left behind. Whatever the cause, Tait and the Rices had become family. And that evening, as Tait wearily entered his home and saw their familiar, welcoming faces, it was like a weight had been lifted from his heart.

  “Oh, Mr. Tait,” Ceily cried when she saw him hanging his hat on the rack by the door. “Elder, come quick! What in heaven’s name happened to you, child?”

  “I fell off a train.”

  “Mercy sakes! Elder, grab his arm there, and let’s get him to the kitchen. Fell off a train. Lawd, if that don’t beat anything I ever heard.”

  As was her habit when faced with a crisis, Ceily offered food. Leftover cornbread and molasses, baked beans simmered with molasses, sweet tater pie made with molasses. Ceily had a bit of a sweet tooth, and molasses was her favorite cure for everything from homesickness to boils.

  Knowing he would have to eat something whether he was hungry or not, Tait chose pie. As he settled in a chair at the kitchen table, his leg stretched out before him, she plunked down a thick slice of pie and a glass of milk . . . milk being her second favorite cure. But just to be triply sure, she rushed off to get the medicine basket she kept in her and Elder’s quarters at the back of the house.

  As soon as she left, Elder took another seat, folded his arms atop the table, and studied Tait hard. Being as quiet as his wife was talkative, he kept his questions brief. “Drunk?”

  “Robbed.”

  “You let him?”

  Tait shrugged. “Not much I could do against a knife. At least when he pushed me off, I took him with me.”

  Elder ruminated on that while Tait finished up the pie and downed the last of the milk. “When she come back,” he advised in a whisper, “tell her you tripped. Otherwise, we never hear the end of it.”

  “She’ll know when I ask her to take out the stitches.”

  “Leave them in.”

  “They itch like hell.”

  “We in trouble, then.”

  Thirty minutes later, stitches removed, every bruise and half-healed cut slathered with salve, his knee wrapped, and his actions thoroughly chastised, he was finally allowed to go to his room.

  It was on the third floor.

  Even with Elder’s help and Ceily’s fussing, he was in such pain by the time he reached it he knew it would be a while before he could sleep. Sending them on to their own beds, he stood at the window and looked out at the city he had called home for almost five years but tonight it felt more like a prison.

  The next morning, he took a hansom cab to Father O’Rourke’s church near the tenement district of Five Points. It was a dismal place. Here, a world away from the wealthy streets toward the other end of the island, struggling immigrants lived in crowded, tight-knit conclaves where English was rarely spoken and grinding poverty opened the door to drunkenness, prostitution, and hopeless despair.

  This was the landscape from which Doyle Kerrigan had sprung, and Tait could only imagine the cruel forces that had helped shape the Irishman into the man he was today. For that reason, more even than the debt he owed Doyle for saving his life, Tait had overlooked some of his partner’s more unprincipled traits.

  But now, with Lucinda caught between them, he could no longer look away or make excuses or distance himself. He had to protect her—even from his friend and partner. Even from himself, if necessary, by staying as far away from her as he could, rather than leave a trail back to whoever it was who wanted her dead.

  But first, he had to find out who that enemy was, and what her pursuer thought she knew or saw that had made her his target. Hopefully, Father O’Rourke could help him with that.

  * * *

  St. Columban’s Catholic Church was a small, unimposing struct
ure on a block crowded with other unimposing structures, yet there seemed to be a fair amount of foot traffic going in and out of the arched oak doors. The coachman was reluctant to wait in such a questionable section of the city, until Tait showed him the extra half eagle he would earn if he stayed.

  Luckily there was a handrail on the front steps, and using that along with the crutch, Tait was able to make it up to the door without too much difficulty. But once inside, his luck ended.

  Father O’Rourke was in Ireland, Father Michaels told him. “He goes back every two years,” the red-cheeked young man explained in a lilting Irish accent, “to help orphaned immigrant children reestablish contact with their relatives in Ireland. Unlike Reverend Brace of the Children’s Aid Society, Father O’Rourke thinks these poor lost angels would be happier among their own in their homeland rather than being shipped off to strangers all over the country.”

  Biting back his frustration, Tait looked out the window to see two of the lost angels trying to relieve his coachman of his money purse. “When will he be back?”

  “Two, perhaps three months.”

  Lucinda might not have three months.

  Returning to the cab just as two more little angels ran up to bedevil the coachman, Tait climbed in and directed the driver to take him to Sixty-ninth Street. Mrs. Throckmorton would have to answer his questions now.

  But Mrs. Throckmorton wasn’t at home, either, Pringle was delighted to inform him when he finally answered Tait’s insistent knock. “She is not expected back until early afternoon,” he intoned, somehow managing to look down his blade-shaped nose at Tait even though he was half a foot shorter. “Shall I tell her you called, Mr. . . .” He let the sentence hang, his brows raised in question.

  “Oh, for the love of God,” Tait snapped, and whirling as best he could on a crutch, stumped back down the stairs.

  With nothing left to do but wait, he directed the coachman to the East Eighty-second Street office of Dr. Alvin Greenwall, an ex-army surgeon who had treated him during his recovery at Harrisburg, and who he had later run into here, in Manhattan. Greenwall’s early years as a physician, coupled with his grisly experiences as a battlefield surgeon had made him one of the most knowledgeable and sought-after doctors in the city, despite his gruff manner and odd sense of humor.