No Comfort for the Lost (24 page)

“I am glad to see you looking better this morning, Barbara.”

Celia placed Owen’s bandaged arm beneath the covers and considered his sleeping face, the long lashes on his closed eyes, the freckles sprayed across his nose and sallow cheeks. His forehead glistened with sweat and his pulse raced, but his condition had greatly improved from last night. After Mr. Greaves had departed, Celia had been able to feed Owen some broth, but the lad had taken only a few sips before falling back asleep.

Celia stood to leave the room. “As for Owen, his wounds have not become inflamed, so that is good news. But he is still very weak.”

“So you won’t leave him,” Barbara said.

“No.” She shut the door and considered her cousin. “I sent a note to the Palmers first thing this morning asking if you can stay with them. Elizabeth has already responded that since Emmeline has been feeling better lately, she will send someone to collect you this afternoon.”

“Oh. The Palmers.” Barbara’s grip on the shawl tightened.

“I thought you would be happy to go to them.”

“Yes, because I’m sure he wouldn’t hurt me . . .” She blanched and looked away.

“
He?
Who do you mean, Barbara?”

“The watcher, of course.” She tried to smile. “I’m tired, and I have a headache. I think I’ll go back to bed for a while.”

She tried to walk off, but Celia grabbed her arm and halted her. “You do not mean the watcher, Barbara. You mean someone else in particular.”

“You’re hurting me, Cousin. Let go.”

“All along, you have known something critical and held back,” Celia accused her. “I was nearly killed last night, Barbara. You cannot have wanted that to happen.”

“He wouldn’t do that!”

“Who, Barbara? Who? You must tell me!”

Barbara was trembling. “I thought I saw him. The night Li Sha died. When he wasn’t supposed to be in town . . .” Her voice trailed off.

Days ago, Barbara had mentioned someone being out of town . . . Mr. Palmer. That was whom she’d mentioned. Her cousin had even asked Celia if she knew if he was back after attending to business outside the city.

“You mean Mr. Palmer, don’t you? Elizabeth told us he was looking at farm property the night Li Sha died and did not return until Tuesday.” But here was Barbara saying quite the opposite. “Did you see him, though?”

“I can’t be certain. It was late—we were returning from the society meeting and I was upset because of the ladies. You remember. But I looked out the carriage window and I thought I saw him riding along Kearney. His roan horse is so distinctive. But it couldn’t have been him, could it? Mrs. Palmer wouldn’t lie about her husband being away from the city. So I’ve got to be wrong, don’t you think?” Barbara asked, wanting Celia’s reassurance of his innocence. She could hardly give it. “Besides, he didn’t have any reason to hurt Li Sha.”

“Not one that we understand.” Celia could think of a possible reason, however, and it involved the baby Li Sha had been carrying. Although Dora had been certain the child was Tom’s.

“But the Palmers were good to her,” continued Barbara. “Despite what she’d been, some fancy prostitute who got enough gifts to buy herself free. They paid for her funeral, after all.”

“If he is so innocent, then why did Mr. Palmer lie about his whereabouts?” Celia asked quietly.

“He didn’t lie. I must be wrong about seeing him. I knew I shouldn’t have said anything. I knew you’d misunderstand.” Her cousin’s chin wobbled, and tears started in her eyes. “You’ve got everything all wrong, Cousin Celia. All wrong,” she cried, breaking free of Celia’s grip and rushing down the hallway as quickly as she could, seeking the solace of her room.

Taylor intercepted Nick on his way to the station after another visit to Uhlfelder’s lodgings.

“Figured out why we haven’t seen hide nor hair of Ahearn, sir . . . Mr. Greaves,” said Taylor, trotting alongside. “And why he wasn’t at the meeting last night. For the past two days he’s been locked up in the Santa Cruz County calaboose for brawling. Don’t know what he was doing down thataways, but I guess it means he didn’t attack Mrs. Davies last night.”

“And he couldn’t have thrown that rat onto her porch Tuesday night, either,” said Nick, halting on the street outside city hall. “He still might’ve killed Tessie Lange, if she was murdered on Monday.”

“Suppose so.”

“What about Lange or Palmer?” Nick asked. “Have you had a chance to check on them?”

“Both of them were out earlier when I went looking for them. Lange’s neighbor says he’s at the undertaker, making arrangements for his daughter’s funeral. Palmer’s clerk claimed he was in a meeting too important to be interrupted. Consulting with our Mr. Douglass, apparently. But wasn’t there something in the paper about Palmer and his wife hobnobbing at a fancy party last night?”

“Which would mean he didn’t attack Mrs. Davies, if it’s true,” said Nick, tipping his hat to a pair of ladies strolling past.

“Guess not, sir,” said Taylor. “Did you talk to the saloonkeeper?”

“Uhlfelder was out as well, but his landlady saw him this morning. Not a bump or bruise on him.” One suspect down, too many to go.

“I’ll go find Lange,” said Nick. “What’s the latest on Wagner?” They might have released the man last night, but he was still a suspect.

“Wagner wasn’t at the customhouse this morning. His boss says he fired him last Friday. Apparently, Wagner was missing a lot of work, and his boss had had enough, but now they’re shorthanded. The man was hopping mad, needing to inventory some smuggled opium they’d apprehended off a merchant vessel fresh in from China. Something like two hundred or more five-tael boxes.” Taylor shook his head over the amount. With a one hundred percent tax on opium, there were plenty of people out to make money by sneaking it in beneath customs’ noses. “Wagner wasn’t at home, either. But his wife was there, as ready as ever to tell us he was with her last night after the meeting.”

“I’ll give her credit for being loyal.”

“Oh, and Eagan looked fine this morning when I saw him, sir,” added Taylor.

Two
suspects down. But the mention of Eagan brought the Men’s Benevolent Association to mind.

“I keep wondering how many men are in that Monday night association, Taylor, and if the group includes our smuggler.” Now,
that
would give Eagan a reason to discourage Nick from investigating Palmer. “I need all their names.”

“I’ll get them. And how about I poke around down by the wharf again, sir, rather than go back to have a look at Palmer right now? Maybe, with a little financial help, somebody’ll know who Roddy really is and where we can find him.” Taylor jingled coins in his pocket and grinned.

“Do I want to know how you managed to get extra money to throw around?” If Taylor were caught in a gambling den, he’d be thrown off the force.

“Nope, sir. You definitely don’t.”

• • •

“
Y
ou will tell Mr. Greaves that my cousin believes she saw Mr. Palmer the evening Li Sha was murdered?” Celia asked the detective, who’d introduced himself as Tobias Briggs. She’d left the house despite Mr. Greaves’ admonition that she stay put, wanting to deliver her message in person, only to have her plans derailed by his absence from the police station.

“It is critical for Mr. Greaves to know that Mr. Palmer may have lied to him,” she said.

Detective Briggs eyed her. She’d seen him, briefly, at Li Sha’s funeral and did not care for his manner. At least he hadn’t stared too long at the bruises on her face.

“Will do, ma’am.”

“Thank you.”

She left the station and decided to walk home. People were out and about, enjoying the sunshine after yesterday’s rain, and she strolled among them up the road’s incline. Walking might help her reason more clearly over Barbara’s information.

Did Joseph Palmer’s claim he was not in San Francisco the night Li Sha died mean he’d killed her, or was there another explanation? Perhaps he’d been engaged in some other illicit activity that evening.

Celia moved out of the path of a shop boy wheeling a handcart as she continued up the hill. There was also what Madame Philippe had told her yesterday. Tessie had been looking for a suspicious man who worked near water. Mr. Palmer owned a warehouse near the harbor. But if Joseph Palmer was the smuggler who called himself Roddy, Mr. Lange would have been alarmed to spot him at Li Sha’s funeral.

Celia paused in front of a pawnshop. The usual items were on display—watches and guns and pieces of jewelry. She squinted. The locket on the topmost shelf looked like the one she had given to Mr. Smith, the locket containing the picture of Patrick so the man could show it while looking for her husband.
Oh dear, Mr. Smith. You
did
pawn the locket, as I’d feared
.

Suddenly she recalled another locket and realized she’d captured the memory that had been eluding her. She knew what was missing from the pile of items Mr. Greaves had handed over at Li Sha’s funeral—a silver locket. Celia had seen the necklace only once or twice, since it was usually hidden beneath the high collar of Li Sha’s dress. Li Sha might have sold the necklace in the days before she’d died, but Celia believed she wouldn’t. For some reason, the girl had been very attached to it. But what was so significant about the locket that Barbara had chosen to keep secret its absence?

Celia had never learned who’d given the necklace to Li Sha. It had been too costly for Tom Davies to afford. Mr. Lange would not raise unseemly questions by providing his employee with such a handsome present. Mr. Douglass? Mr. Greaves thought he was connected to Li Sha, but Celia’s observation of the man only ever indicated that he possessed disdain for the Chinese race.

Would Connor Ahearn have given a lovely necklace to a Chinese prostitute? He’d known Li Sha, but Mr. Greaves had claimed Mr. Ahearn hated her. And Celia could not speak for the mysterious smuggler called Roddy.

Which left one man. Joseph Palmer could certainly afford a fine locket. Barbara must have suspected Mr. Palmer had given it to Li Sha, or perhaps Barbara knew that he had. She might also have reasoned that its absence somehow connected him to the girl’s death.

Had Li Sha come to ask Joseph Palmer for money the evening he was supposed to be miles away? Had he wrenched the necklace from her neck, to remove the clue linking him to her, after he’d killed her in a rage? And the afternoon that Celia had encountered him on the street, he’d made certain to comment that Li Sha had sold all of her valuables. Had he done so hoping that if Celia had noticed the necklace was missing, she wouldn’t conclude the murderer had taken it off the girl’s body?

“And Tom,” she muttered, “told me plainly Li Sha had not sold all her gifts.”

He’d known, too, that Li Sha had held on to one item, but Celia had been unable to fit the various comments together. Until now.

Celia gripped the straps of her reticule. Had Joseph Palmer killed Tessie as well? And had he left those terrible warnings for Celia’s own family? He might have cleverly disguised his handwriting and left the notes, but to terrify Barbara so thoroughly and then to attack Celia . . .

But what if he hadn’t been after her, but after Barbara? Had he come to their house last night in a failed effort to silence her cousin, who knew too many of his secrets? No wonder Barbara had balked at the idea of going to the Palmers’ today. She must have come to fear him at last, and knew she was no longer safe from him.

Celia started to run toward home.

• • •

C
elia hurtled through the front door. She threw down her reticule and sprinted up the staircase, her many layers of skirts tangling around her ankles.

“Ma’am, what is it now?” asked Addie, hastening into the entryway.

“I’ve remembered,” Celia called out, breathing hard from the dash up Kearney.

She rounded the banister and hurried down the hallway, pausing to catch her breath before tapping on the closed door to her cousin’s bedchamber.

“Barbara? May I come in? I need to speak to you urgently.” There was no reply. “Barbara?” she asked again, and opened the door. The bedchamber was empty.

Celia rushed back out into the hallway and down to the room Owen occupied. He lay deeply asleep and quite alone. She leaned over the balustrade. “Addie! Where is Barbara?”

Addie looked up at her. “She isna upstairs?”

“No. Did the Palmers come to fetch her?”

“No, ma’am. But there was that message that came for her right after you went to the police station,” said Addie. “Very secretive about it, she was, and wouldna say who’d sent it. She must’ve slipped out without my knowing.”

“We have to find that message, Addie. It might tell us where she’s gone.”

Celia returned to her cousin’s bedchamber as the housekeeper’s footsteps sounded on the staircase.

“Help me look, Addie. I am hoping she left that note here.”

Celia rummaged around in drawers and atop her cousin’s dressing table, pushing aside brushes and mirrors, a photo of Barbara’s father. Celia searched her cousin’s wardrobe, shaking out boots and slippers and hunting through pockets. Addie turned down the covers on Barbara’s bed and looked beneath the pillows, lifted the hair-and-spring mattress.

With a sigh, Addie let the mattress drop back into place. “Nothing, ma’am.”

Barbara had likely taken the note with her.

“Wait, is this it?” Addie bent to retrieve a crumpled scrap of paper from the dustbin. She smoothed out the creases.

Celia took the paper from her.

B—

You and your cousin have nothing to fear from me. Meet me at Union Square at two and I shall explain.

J

Barbara had gone to meet Joseph Palmer, who called the girl by her Christian name. A man with secrets whom Barbara had willingly protected in a naïve display of loyalty and affection.

Addie stared at the note Celia handed her. “What does it mean, ma’am?”

Celia glanced at the watch pinned to her waist—half two. She might already be too late to intercept them.

“I am going to Union Square to look for Barbara, and if she is not there, I will head to the Palmers’ house.”

“Now you’re off, too?”

Celia rushed back downstairs, Addie on her heels.

“I need you to go to the police station and tell Detective Greaves or Officer Taylor—gad, I hope they are there now—that Miss Barbara has gone to meet Mr. Palmer at Union Square. She saw him here in town the night Li Sha died, and I am very concerned. Mr. Greaves will understand. Tell him where I’m going, as well.” He would be angry with her, but she could not wait for either his approval or his assistance. “And while you are there, also tell him I have remembered what was missing. A necklace.”

“But I dinna understand! Is Miss Barbara in danger?”

“I pray not, but she very well could be.” Celia collected her bonnet and shawl. Her silver letter opener winked at her from a parlor side table. She had left it there that morning after Addie had fetched the mail from the post office and Celia had separated private correspondence from the bills. Before events had begun to spin toward an inevitable conclusion, sucking Celia in like a maelstrom.

On a whim, she picked up the letter opener and tucked it into her pocket.

“And what are you thinking of doing with
that
?” Addie’s voice was growing strident.

“Nothing, I hope. But since we do not have that gun Mr. Greaves recommended and your cleaver’s too cumbersome—”

“Och! What is this world coming to?”

“Dangerous and dark things, Addie. Dangerous and dark,” Celia answered. “Now, please hurry.”

“Aye, I’ll fetch that detective. And pray for your fool head while I’m about it,” she said, and stormed off.

Celia closed her fingers around the narrow silver blade in her pocket.

Dangerous and dark things, indeed.

• • •

C
elia leaned through the window of the hack and searched the paths and benches of Union Square. “Circle again,” she demanded of the driver.

“It’s your dime, ma’am.”

Dust scuttled across the square’s intersecting paths, and the chime of church bells echoed. A man and woman rose from a bench, and Celia’s hopes lifted for a moment until she realized they weren’t Barbara and Mr. Palmer.

“I would like to make a stop on Sutter, driver,” she said, giving him the address of Joseph Palmer’s office. It wasn’t far and Barbara might have decided to head there, if he had not shown up for their meeting.

“Yes, ma’am.”

Celia settled back against the seat and looked at her watch. Ten minutes had passed since she’d hailed the cab. Ten more precious minutes.

“Hurry, driver!”

• • •

A
fter returning to the station from Lange’s, where he’d found no incriminating lump on the man’s forehead, Nick had just pulled out his desk chair and dropped onto the seat when Taylor charged through the door.

“You’ll never believe what I learned down at the Vallejo Street Wharf, sir.”

Nick raised his brows, waiting.

Taylor dragged over a chair and sat. “I was asking ’round about Roddy when I found a warehouse worker who’d been checking on a shipment that arrived the night Li Sha was killed. Well, he
claims
he was checking on a shipment. I’m thinking he was planning on adding to his income by pinching some of the goods and reselling them. Especially as happy as he was to take the coins I was offering—”

“What did he see, Taylor?” Someday his assistant would learn to get to the point.

“He saw a buggy that Monday night. A nice buggy with shiny red wheels, which was what made him notice it. It was nicer than most of the traps and wagons that come around the wharf.”

Red wheels. Where had Nick seen a buggy with red wheels before? He sat up straight in his chair. At Li Sha’s funeral.