When I Meet You

by Olivia Newport

  Nolan peered. “Hard to be sure.”

  “Well, I’ll have a look,” Luke said. “This is quite a pile.”

  “There’s no time frame.”

  “I still have some connections in the banks, depending on what I find. Can I share these?”

  “Just keep me posted who has eyes on them,” Nolan said.

  From there Nolan went to Denver. He had just enough time before his first meeting to stop in a colleague’s office and watch his eyes grow large at the sight of the historical documents.

  “You drop something like this in front of a history nerd and then stand there with one of your silly grins on your face?” Pete said.

  “I need somebody to help me understand what they mean.” Nolan leaned over the desk.

  “How many billable hours are there in this?”

  “Exactly zero.”

  “One of your pro bono projects?”

  “More or less.”

  “You dog. Where did you get this?” Pete turned sheets over from one neat pile to another.

  Nolan gave him the short version of the story as Pete continued to scan documents.

  “On the surface of things,” Pete said, “given the timing, I’d wager this Bendeure & Company’s interest in Colorado was to expand financial investments into the revitalized Colorado mining and financial markets after the mining industry recovered following the 1893 recession. The recession was nationwide, but by about 1906, downtown Denver was back on track. Certainly by 1909 many people would have considered it safe to invest again.”

  “But is there any funny business going on?”

  “You want an opinion based on a four-minute audit of two hundred pages of numbers?”

  “You can have the full five minutes,” Nolan said.

  The speaker on Pete’s desk buzzed, and he pushed a button. “Yes?”

  “The McCormicks have arrived,” a voice said. “I put them in the conference room.”

  “Thank you. I’ll be right out.” To Nolan, Pete said, “I’ll get back to you.”

  At the end of the day, Nolan shot Jillian a text message to let her know when he was leaving the office. When she didn’t acknowledge at least with a thumb-up emoji, he dared to hope she was napping before dinner, though he recognized the foolishness of the thought. Even when Jillian was a preschooler, Bella couldn’t get her to stay down for a decent nap. Other mothers talked about everything they got accomplished while their kids napped—even if it was simply enjoying two hours of quiet in the house—but Bella knew not to plan on doing more than reading the mail and loading the dishwasher. Some days it was one or the other, she used to say, before Silly Jilly would pop up, afraid she was missing something. Bella was the first one to use that nickname. Jillian was twenty-eight and far from silly now. Nolan suspected she tolerated his use of the nickname because it reminded both of them of Bella and made it feel like she was still part of them.

  Of course she would always be part of them.

  Traffic was on the heavy side, but Nolan finally made it out of downtown and headed west on I-70 toward Canyon Mines. On congested days, the commute could take closer to forty-five minutes than thirty, but once he was headed west and the views of the Rockies saturated his eyes, the day’s pressures sloughed off his shoulders. He had arranged to take the next two days off, only touching base at work on essential issues, so he could face reality on the commitment to cook for Marilyn, which had snowballed into two hundred meals.

  Nolan approached the house through the back door, which stood open, and immediately knew something was wrong. Every window in the kitchen and dining room was also open.

  “Jillian!”

  No answer. He tossed his briefcase and keys on the breakfast bar.

  Glass crunched beneath a shoe, and he drew back his foot. Mingled with food remains, shards of glass strewed a path across the kitchen. And blood. That was blood. He was sure of it. The oven door was wide open.

  “Jillian!”

  Her office was empty. Nolan took the back stairs two at a time, letting out his breath only when his daughter’s bedroom door cracked, and he saw her head wrapped in a towel, her body snug in a bathrobe. He exhaled relief.

  “I’m all right, Dad. I’ll be right down to clean up the mess.”

  “What happened, Jilly?” He didn’t care about the mess.

  “I took a break to get supper in the oven. An unstuffed cabbage casserole. You know I never could make actual stuffed cabbage rolls. They would just fall apart. But I forgot to set the timer, and the smoke alarm went off. It wouldn’t stop. I had to open all the windows. The casserole had burned to a crisp, of course, and I dropped it getting it out of the oven. Then I stepped in it with no shoes.”

  “How bad is the cut?”

  “It’s all right now. I finally got the bleeding stopped. I won’t be taking any morning runs for a few days.”

  “Did you burn your hands?” She turned her palms to his inspection. “I let go too fast for any real damage.”

  “I will clean up the kitchen,” Nolan said. “And I’ll call for Chinese food.”

  “Sorry. Guess I could have used a nap after all. I might have had better judgment on a few decisions.”

  “Don’t worry about it. Come down when you’re ready.”

  Nolan stopped in his own bedroom long enough to get out of his suit and into clothing more appropriate for restoring order to the kitchen. By the time Jillian finished cleaning herself up and limped down the stairs, beef and snow peas and cashew chicken were on the way. Nolan settled Jillian in the purple chair, the only place she ever wanted to sit in the living room, helped her prop up her bandaged foot, and brought her a large glass of cold water.

  “No more coffee for you,” he said. “Tonight you sleep.”

  “No argument from me there,” she said.

  “Before this disaster, how was your day?”

  “Reasonable. I got a few things checked off my list, and in between read the Pinkerton’s letters about six more times.”

  “And?”

  The doorbell rang, and Nolan pivoted toward it, returning a minute later with the aromatic brown bag. “I’ll get plates.”

  They shared the fried rice and both entrees, and he prodded Jillian to resume her report of her day. If she got some of this out of her system, maybe it would help her let go and sleep tonight. And he might garner some clue about why it had become so urgent to her.

  “It’s pretty easy to see what they were discussing,” she said. “People were representing themselves as financial agents to get access to other people’s money. This Lynnelle Bendeure seemed determined to come to Denver and sort out whatever her father had gotten involved in.”

  “Foul play?” Nolan scooped up a forkful of the chicken, seasoned just the way he liked it.

  Jillian nodded. “I’ve been looking for Lynnelle Bendeure on and off all night and all day. But she seems to have done a disappearing act.”

  “You only started looking last night,” Nolan said. “Perhaps it’s too soon to conclude anything.”

  “I’m telling you, Dad, something happened to her that shouldn’t have.”

  Nolan nodded, placating, and swallowed a chunk of pineapple. “I had Pete look at the papers today. The time frame is such that people were investing in gold mines again after the bottom fell out of silver. The records are buried in general business records of the company.”

  “That’s all he came up with?”

  “He did observe that the pattern of influx of cash in this case seems irregular.”

  “Irregular how?”

  “Apparently that will take a closer look. We’ll have to get the right people on it—just to set Rich’s mind at ease.”

  “If we follow the money, it will tell us what foul play happened to Lynnelle.”

  “Maybe,” Nolan said. “But when I took you with me to the Owens House Museum, I just thought you’d like the trunk. No one is expecting you to find a missing person from so long ago. That’s not
Rich’s question.”

  “But it’s mine. I’m going to find her, Dad.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  Denver, Colorado

  April 2, 1909

  Dear Miss Bendeure,

  Your questions are astute, and I will endeavor to address them based both on my own observations and the wider experience of the Pinkerton’s Agency across the nation. The operations we investigate most similar to the one that Bendeure & Company may be caught up in come in a variety of forms. The commonalities, however, are convincing duplicity, gaining trust, and acting swiftly when the moment is ripe. In some cases, the individuals we apprehend have operated under multiple identities, whether invented or appropriated wrongfully. They may have participated in lesser roles before becoming more daring. They may be young or old, male or female. Financial institutions are rarely intentionally culpable. We work closely with them and find them fully cooperative nearly one hundred percent of the time. For some time now, we have annually reported the details of our work to the American Bankers Association. All it takes is an eye for finding a weak spot. I am not suggesting your father has been weak. To the contrary, he has asked more questions than most I have known in these circumstances, and this speaks well of him. I have had several fruitful conversations in recent days that seem to point in the same direction, and while I cannot give you complete answers on this date, it is my hope that neither of us will be waiting much longer.

  Yours sincerely,

  James McParland

  Manager, Western Division

  Pinkerton’s National Detective Agency

  Friday, May 21, 1909

  Chicago, Illinois

  “Were you able to find it?” Lynnelle took the claim check from the porter’s hand outside her compartment on the second leg of her travels.

  “Yes, miss. Your trunk made the transfer safely and is aboard this train now headed for Omaha.”

  Lynnelle leaned back in the seat outside her compartment. “Oh good. Thank you so much for indulging me and putting my mind at ease by checking.”

  “It was no trouble.”

  Another Pullman car also on a line operated by the New York Central, the compartment was nearly identical to the one in which Lynnelle departed Cleveland the day before yesterday. This time her wicker case sat on a bench across from the sink.

  According to the schedule, this day’s journey would be nearly fourteen hours after the train left Chicago before the final leg from Omaha to Denver began in the middle of the night. After leaving Cousin Marabel late last evening, boarding the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern line out of Chesterton to Chicago to connect to the Union Pacific line, she’d slept a few hours in a downtown hotel before breakfasting heartily in Chicago. Now, reassured that her trunk was making the trip as well, she was tempted to nap in her compartment at the back of the car. She wouldn’t ask the porter to make the bed in the middle of the day, but she could at least remove her hat and shoes to doze without anyone staring at her.

  She tipped the porter. “Thank you again.”

  “Lynnelle!”

  The iridescent eyes of two days earlier sparkled at Lynnelle once again.

  “Hello, you two,” she said.

  “Good morning, Miss Bendeure.” Henry Hollis rose from the bench outside Lynnelle’s compartment, gesturing for her to join them.

  “Please call me Lynnelle.” A nap could wait a few more minutes.

  “Such a lovely name,” Clarice said. “Like a song.”

  Lynnelle laughed as she sat down. “No one’s ever said that before.”

  “Where does it come from?”

  “My mother always said it was Welsh. How was your day in Chicago?”

  “Utterly fabulous. We went to gawk at all the mansions on Prairie Avenue, where all the obscenely rich people live.”

  “Clarice.” Henry patted his wife’s hand. “You might have pointed out that we went to the art museum.”

  “That too.”

  “We are not completely without culture,” Henry said. “And a springtime walk along Lake Michigan.”

  “So romantic.” Clarice’s gaze briefly lost its focus in wistfulness.

  “It sounds as if you made a full and satisfying day of it,” Lynnelle said.

  “Perhaps we’ll never have another opportunity,” Clarice said. “Back to Cleveland and the aunts after the wedding.”

  “When is the ceremony?”

  “Sunday evening.” Clarice elbowed her husband. “But this one couldn’t get another week away from his office, so we’ll have to get back on a train the very next morning.”

  “That’s too bad.”

  “Did you enjoy your visit with your cousin?”

  “Immensely,” Lynnelle said. “She sent me off with a picnic basket of biscuits and cookies and jams and apples, as if she doesn’t trust railroad dining cars. Even a jar of green olives.”

  “The aunts would say one never knows,” Henry said.

  “That’s just what Marabel said!”

  The whistle blew. Henry looked at his watch. “Departing right on time.”

  A shudder coursed through the car, and passengers up the aisle reflexively gripped armrests as the locomotive coaxed its massive load into motion. A few still stowing their belongings found their balance slightly challenged as speed picked up and the train advanced out of the Dearborn Station and across Chicago neighborhoods.

  “Are these your seats?” Lynnelle asked.

  “We’re in the next car, actually,” Clarice said. “But we were stretching our legs, and then I spotted you with the porter and wanted to be sure we said hello. Imagine finding each other again.”

  “It is a bright bit of fun, indeed.”

  They’d had coffee together on the leg from Cleveland, and when the Hollises later spotted her walking past their seats headed for a simple meal, they decided they could do with a bite as well. Exchanging stories of the aunts and Cousin Marabel had them all chortling so hard they could hardly chew. More than a few heads turned toward the ruckus of Clarice’s imitation of the aunts. It wasn’t like Lynnelle at all, but the breach in decorum produced a soothing release of stress in her shoulders, and she’d been grateful.

  A porter approached. “Excuse me, sir, but it seems that you are in the seats that this couple have specifically arranged for.”

  Henry popped up and tugged Clarice with him. “My apologies.”

  “Mr. Meade!” Lynnelle said.

  “You know these folks?” Clarice said.

  “I met them on the same train where I met you,” Lynnelle said. “This is Carey and Willie Meade, of Rochester or thereabout. This is Henry and Clarice Hollis, from Cleveland. It seems we’re all headed to Denver.”

  “What a great big beautiful country,” Willie said.

  “We’ll leave you to your seats,” Henry said. “We staked our claim in the proper car, but we would do well to be sure we haven’t been displaced.”

  “Now you know where I am.” Lynnelle pointed over her shoulder. “My compartment is just there.”

  “We could have a meal together again,” Clarice said.

  Willie spread her hands. “Why not all of us?”

  “Why not?” Carey said. “We’re probably all changing trains in Omaha. We’re going to be together for a couple of days. Might as well have some friendly faces.”

  “Lynnelle?” Clarice said.

  Lynnelle nodded. Once her large breakfast wore off, she’d want to eat. Willie and Clarice, with their lively temperaments, were similar enough to surely get on well.

  “A fashionably late lunch it is!” Willie said.

  “Or a quirkishly early dinner, in deference to the aunts.” Clarice grinned.

  Lynnelle blinked. The conversation had progressed swiftly from the theoretical meal to the specific. The men checked their watches and agreed on a time to meet in the dining car, the wives consented, and Lynnelle was nodding agreement all in the space of one minute. The Hollises left, and the Meades settled into their seats
.

  “What a pleasant coincidence that we are all back on the same train.” Lynnelle settled her hands on the satchel on her lap. “What are the odds?”

  “Well,” Carey said, “let’s see. How many cars were there on the previous train? A predictable fraction of passengers would be terminating in Chicago and others continuing westward, and I suppose it’s not uncommon to take a day to enjoy the city if one has the time and opportunity, and the means for the overnight stay and a fresh start on a morning train rather than enduring overnight travel if not necessary. The railroads could probably supply the numbers. It’s a matter of simple mathematics.”

  Willie slapped his forearm. “Silly. She doesn’t actually want you to calculate the odds.”

  Lynnelle’s smile was plaintive. “My brother used to tease like that. He would make quite a show of it in front of guests, to my mother’s consternation.”

  “I might have to meet this brother of yours,” Carey said.

  “I’m afraid he has departed this life. My mother as well.”

  “See what you’ve done, Carey,” Willie said. “You’ve made Lynnelle sad.”

  “Quite the opposite,” Lynnelle said. “It was a lovely memory.”

  “I’m sorry about your other new friends,” Willie said, “but I’m secretly very glad that we’re lucky enough to have seats right outside your compartment.”

  “It will be handy, won’t it?” Lynnelle said. “I had the oddest experience yesterday while I was visiting my cousin in Chesterton. I thought I saw you.”

  “Us?” Carey said.

  “Only Willie,” Lynnelle said. “It was a fleeting thing. A woman ducking into a shop in a small town in Indiana while we were out to lunch, and for a moment I persuaded myself it was someone I’d met on the train. Wishful thinking, I suppose.”

  “I’m flattered.” Willie grinned. “If I could have been in two places at once, I’m sure one of them would have been Chesterton.”

  “The same thing happened last night when I arrived at my hotel in Chicago. Just a glimpse of someone across the lobby. The back of a woman walking away.”

  “Oh how odd,” Willie said. “But now we have all the way to Denver, and at least until Omaha we are next-door neighbors.”