Parlor Games (52 page)

“What in the world?” Gene asked.

“I thought a reporter might be lurking about.”

“No, no cars around.”

I righted myself. “Oh, I thought I saw one earlier.”

We reached the train station near the tail end of boarding time. After I purchased my ticket and the attendant loaded my suitcases onto the wagon, Gene accompanied me to the platform.

I knew I might never see him again, but I couldn’t pour my heart out to him. I dropped my travel bag down and, gripping Tokyo’s leash, reached my arms around him. “Love you, little brother.”

He leaned over to hug me, but his grip was limp. “Will you send the money or come back with it?”

“I can’t say yet.”

Gene released his hold. “When will we hear from you?”

“Give me two weeks.”

The stationmaster hollered, “All aboard.”

“You better get going,” said Gene.

I grabbed my case and stepped up into the car. As I coaxed Tokyo up the stairs, I turned toward the platform. Gene stood just as I’d left him, groggy and slump-shouldered. I waved to him. He lifted his hand to elbow level and opened it to a lackluster wave. Poor Gene. What did he have to look forward to now but dreary Menominee?

To conserve funds, I’d taken a second-class seat, which I straightaway found and settled into, removing my hat and coat and turning to the window. I was in no mood for conversation. All the money I had to my name was a meager $1,863. I had left Daisy word to await my instructions. Soon I’d no longer be able to afford her services, and she’d eventually make her way back to New York, but I’d not go there. In fact, I’d get as far away from here as I could. Look at
this countryside—nothing but snow-covered fields and logged-out woods as far as the eye can see.

Here and there, we whisked past isolated farmhouses, so similar one could be forgiven for picturing their inhabitants as paper cutouts of men a-milking in dungarees and pink-cheeked wives bustling about their kitchens. And had someone ordained that they all paint their houses white and their barns red?

No, I thought, even Canada is too close. Nor would I get near the war in Europe, especially with the United States about to enter the fray any day. I’ll cross the Pacific, find some haven to make a fresh start, and tell no one of my whereabouts. Forty-seven is not so very old. My figure is still pleasing, my hair mostly brown.

A voice startled me out of my reverie. “Why, Baroness de Vries.”

I looked up. Reed Dougherty’s gaunt face loomed over me. My God, might he foil my escape? What I wouldn’t give to make him disappear. If only Daisy were with me, we could plot to throw him in a ditch. I summoned a cool “Good day, Mr. Dougherty.”

“Would you care to accompany me to the dining car? I’ll gladly buy you breakfast.”

Would I never be free of this cursed man, with his bent for inserting himself in my life at the least opportune moment? He’d obviously been watching me from the taxi this morning. “You are too kind,” I said. “But I really have no appetite.”

“Surely you wouldn’t mind a cup of coffee.”

“My apologies, Mr. Dougherty, but it is the company I would mind.”

“Come, now. There is a little detail we really must discuss. It’d be a shame to dine alone when we could be enjoying lively company.”

There was no hiding from him now—or the latest “little detail” he intended to harass me with. I herded Tokyo into his traveling case and rose from my seat. No words passed between Dougherty and me as we shuffled through the swaying cars.

“Are you sure you won’t eat anything?” Mr. Dougherty asked once the waiter visited our table.

My stomach had awakened, and I decided I might as well allow Dougherty to buy my breakfast. “Perhaps some griddle cakes to warm me up. And coffee.”

Mr. Dougherty ordered eggs and potatoes and began his questioning, as I knew he would.

“Might I ask where you’re bound?”

“Of course you understand I have some business to attend to.”

“Ah, yes, perhaps there are some assets you must sell?”

“What business is it of yours, Mr. Dougherty?”

“It’s only fair to inform you that Miss Shaver has secured my services.”

“Frank did not learn of you from me. You must have contacted her.”

“On the contrary, it was she who contacted me.”

Our coffee arrived, and I stirred a generous helping of cream into mine. “I don’t believe you.”

Dougherty drank his black. Raising the cup to his narrow lips, he said, “Have I ever deceived you, madam?”

“In fact, you have. The very first time we met.”

“Yes, of course.” He put on a rakish sneer. “I plead guilty. In the line of duty and all that.”

“So why should I believe you now?”

“If you must know, Miss Shaver learned of me through Dr. Whidbey’s London detective.”

“And straightaway hired you?”

“No, she only hired me yesterday, after the verdict came in.”

“So you traveled all the way up here just in case she might hire you?” That seemed odd. I couldn’t help but wonder if Ernest too had hired Dougherty. “Or are you also in Dr. Whidbey’s employ?”

“No, but I learned some very interesting things during my London visit.”

“What happened in London has no bearing on the current situation.”

“I couldn’t say that. But my foremost concern is the money you owe Miss Shaver.”

“Why do you think I left town?”

“You mean other than to jump the judgment?”

“I’m going to secure the funds.”

He took a sip of coffee and wrapped his hands around his cup. “And I’m going to make sure you do.”

I sighed, to show how tiresome I found this line of conversation. “You needn’t worry.”

The waiter wheeled the tray to our table and slipped our breakfast plates before us.

I studied Dougherty’s face. He still sported a mustache and beard, which no doubt hid some of the age lines creeping onto his long face. For the first time I noticed gray tingeing the dark hair at his temples. “Have you a family, Mr. Dougherty?”

“A wife, but no children.”

“What a shame. I’m sure you would make a wonderful father.”

“I hardly make a good husband, traveling as much as I do.”

I extracted my napkin from under my silverware. “Perhaps one of these days you’ll settle down.”

“Not in the near future.”

“Then I’m sorry for your wife. She must miss you terribly when you travel.”

He shrugged, as if embarrassed at being found out.

“Why, look,” I said, “you traveled all the way to Menominee before you’d even secured the case.”

“My employer did, of course, approve the trip.” Dougherty took up his knife and fork.

“And do I have him to thank for this breakfast?”

“My dear Baroness, when did you ever question who was paying your way?”

“Why, whenever I suspected their motives.”

He tossed his head back in laughter. “I truly have missed our chats. Please, do enjoy your breakfast.”

I hadn’t planned on Dougherty’s watching over me like a devoted dog the whole train ride. He probably intended to hound me until I paid the fifty-seven-thousand-dollar judgment, and I simply couldn’t allow him to corner me. I had purchased fare no farther than Chicago, to allow myself time to determine my next destination, but hadn’t told him I intended to stop there.

After I alighted from the train and gathered my luggage for taxi transport, Dougherty approached.

“Baroness de Vries, you weren’t going to leave without saying good-bye.”

“How could I be so rude?”

“Are you staying long in my fair city?”

“Yes,” I said, hoping to throw him off my trail. “I intend to stop a few weeks to see to some business matters.”

“And might I ask where you’re staying?”

“No, you may not.”

“My agreement with Miss Shaver requires me to keep you in my sights.”

“That won’t be necessary. I understand I must abide by the court’s judgment.”

“You have proven yourself a most dangerous woman, a woman not to be trusted.”

“Claiming I’m dangerous is merely a means to feather your nest. You, sir, are the height of perversity.” I signaled to the taxi edging toward me.

“You know if you don’t produce the money the house and your brothers’ automobile business will be taken over by the court?”

I turned away from him and reached for the cab door.

He cut between me and the auto. “Do you really want to drag your own flesh and blood down with you?”

“You needn’t interject yourself in my affairs, Mr. Dougherty.” I stepped around him.

He turned on his heel and clapped a hand on the cab door. Reaching into his inside suit pocket, he extracted a folded paper and, one-handed, flapped it open. “I have here documentation of the insurance money Lloyd’s paid out on your yellow-diamond necklace, a necklace you happen to be in possession of.”

Blood rushed up my neck, into my cheeks, over my forehead. I felt my ears might explode from the pressure.

He cocked his head. “And Scotland Yard would certainly be interested in that little detail.”

I glared into his beady eyes. The scoundrel had been toying with me, like a cat batting a mouse about, waiting until the last possible moment to pounce. As never before, I grasped the urge to murder. If I’d had a gun in my hand, I would have leveled it at him.

He opened the taxi door. “But I’m sure we can reach an agreeable arrangement. Which hotel do you wish to register at?”

In a flash it became clear to me—I would need to either bargain with or outwit him. Forcing calm into my voice, I stated, “The Congress.”

He motioned for me to enter the taxi and slid in after me. After loading our luggage, the driver sped off.

Relaxing into his seat as if he were in his own private parlor, Dougherty said, “I believe you’ll find my proposal quite generous. If you produce fifty-seven thousand dollars and the necklace, I’ll turn the piece over to Lloyd’s. I won’t even mention you or your accomplices.”

“Where did you ever get the idea I own such a necklace?”

His crossed one leg over the other. “Apparently, you couldn’t resist showing it off to Miss Shaver.”

A GAME OF CAT AND MOUSE
THE END OF THE LINE—FEBRUARY 1917

D
ougherty accompanied me to the hotel, where I secured a suite large enough to accommodate myself and Daisy. He agreed to allow me four days to produce the fifty-seven thousand dollars, during which time he would keep me under surveillance. If I failed to deliver the funds and my yellow-diamond necklace at 5 p.m. on Tuesday, February 6, he would seize all my belongings and alert Scotland Yard to my “crime of insurance fraud.” And he warned me against trying to slip away: “After all, I’ve never failed to track you down.”

I immediately wired Daisy:
LEAVE ON MORNING TRAIN FOR CHICAGO STOP COME TO CONGRESS HOTEL STOP
. That would put Daisy into Chicago the next evening, Saturday.

I spent Saturday window-shopping all around Chicago, to give myself time to think, and to keep Mr. Dougherty’s colleague occupied. The pudgy fellow I roused from his lobby roost tagged after me all afternoon, likely walking off a few pounds that day, which he promptly replaced over dinner across the Congress dining room from me. Watching him chew his cud while he kept his eyes fastened on me was enough to resolve me to take all future meals in the suite.

Once Daisy arrived, I explained the dire circumstances.

She sat beside me on the sofa in our room, her still-packed suitcases piled beside the wall and her coat cast over them. “Good heavens, that devil really has boxed you in this time.”

“Yes, I fear that myself.”

“Can you come up with the money?”

I drummed my fingers on the sofa arm. “Even if I sold all my jewels, I couldn’t get enough value on such short notice.”

I hadn’t told Daisy about Dougherty’s mention of the yellow-diamond necklace and threat of insurance fraud. It would only have prompted her to panicked flight, and I needed her assistance. Still, perhaps because she feared detection as an accomplice, she introduced the topic.

“Shouldn’t you at least get rid of the yellow-diamond necklace? So it won’t be found on you?”