Searching for Home (Spies of Chicago Book 1) (13 page)

A servant approaching from down the hall startled her, but Ellen had heard enough. The Rat Palace and nine o’clock were the only bits of information that mattered. Not that she knew where or what The Rat Palace could be, but she concocted a fool-proof plan anyway.

Aunt Louisa puffed when Ellen entered the drawing room. “I am quite put out with your Mr. Kent.”

Ellen bowed her head toward her aunt. “I’m sorry I disappeared today during our shopping excursion. The blame is mine, not James’s. I forced him to take me along and—”

With a loud
clank
, Aunt Louisa set down her cup. “Oh, that’s no matter. I’m talking about his interactions with my friend’s daughter, Hattie Prisimon.” She pulled a handkerchief from her sleeve and made a showing of dabbing her dry eyes.

“What account with her could upset you so much?” Ellen toyed with the deep blue ribbon on her dress.

Aunt’s cheeks grew red. “Hattie cried all day because James told her she is boring and no man will ever want her company.”

Ellen leaned over the edge of the chair to pat her aunt’s hand. “I’ve known James most of my life, and I can’t believe he would say a thing like that. But leave it to me, Aunt. I’ll speak with him and force him to make amends.”

She left the room in search for James. Voices by the front door carried, and when Ellen walked around the staircase, she saw James shaking the Englishman’s hand.

The door clicked close. James turned toward her. For a moment, his face and shoulders sagged with some unknown burden. But in an instant, he schooled his expression and smiled. “How are you tonight?”

Shaking the image of him downcast from her mind, she crossed her arms. “Unwell. I have to give you a set-down.”

He leaned against the entrance wall. “And when have those words ever made you look so dour?”

But his usual deflective banter wouldn’t deter her. “What dealings have you had with Hattie Prisimon?”

A smirk pulled at the left side of his lips. He took a step forward. “Are you jealous?”

Ellen shooed him away. “Not by half. But if you walk into the room where my aunt sits, she will have your head.”

“I can’t pretend to know what this is about. Come, it’s been a stressful day, let’s play a round of chess. Maybe I can finally best you.” He motioned for Ellen to follow him to the sitting room.

Unmoved, she gave him her best glare.

James raked his hand through his hair. “Your aunt urged me to dance with her at Cobb’s bash, so I did. After a pathetic excuse for dancing, we visited for a few minutes, and then on McCormick’s boat outing, we spoke again. That’s the extent of my dealings with her. I promise.”

“Aunt says Hattie’s been crying all day over something you said to her.”

Eyes narrowing, he rubbed his jaw. “I don’t recall saying anything offensive.”

“She claims you told her she is boring and no man will want her.”

His head snapped up. “I’d never. You know me better than that.” He threw his hands in the air. “She did drone on about her mother’s pin collection and I told her I didn’t care to hear about it.”

“I can’t believe you said such a thing to her.”

“Ellen.” He reached for her. “You were alone on the side of the ship. Only moments later a man shoved you overboard. If I hadn’t snubbed Hattie, what would have happened to you?”

“That’s immaterial.” She swept his hand away. “A girl’s feelings are hurt, and you need to do something to make it better.”

He set his jaw. “If Hattie Prisimon wants to get on in life she needs to summon a tougher constitution. You know I didn’t intend the meaning she took from our exchange.”

“Your intent is of little consequence. Tomorrow morning, you need to seek her out and apologize to her.”

He crossed his arms and leaned a shoulder against the doorjamb. “Why on earth should I apologize for something I didn’t mean for her to take as she did?”

“Because meant or not, you injured her.”

His voice rose. “But her reaction is not my responsibility.”

“Oh.” She stomped her foot. “You are insufferable.” Ellen thumped his chest. “Your meaning is the part that doesn’t matter. If you have caused pain, it is your responsibility to rectify and heal.”

“I disagree—”

“Don’t speak, James.” She covered his mouth. “Imagine you are in the kitchen.”

He grabbed her wrist, jerking her hand away. “What the devil am I doing in a kitchen?”

Ellen growled. “Imagine!”

He closed his eyes.

“Are you picturing yourself in a kitchen?”

A pause followed by raised eyebrows and his tight-lipped smile. “Yes, yes. I’m surrounded by puddings and cooked ham. Pray continue.”

“The sarcasm is unnecessary.” She jabbed him in the ribs. “Now, say you had a butchering knife in your hand and someone walks in—”

His eyes popped open. “A butchering knife? This exercise is becoming more absurd by the minute.”

Ellen snapped her fingers. James closed his eyes again.

“And someone walks into the kitchen and you don’t know they are there. As you turn, you stab them by accident.”

“We go from absurd to downright ghastly.”

“So this person falls to the ground and they’re bleeding. In that moment do you look at them and say they shouldn’t have walked into your knife?”

When he opened his eyes this time, softness appeared, but the gleam of mischief lingered. “I might.”

Ellen reached for his hand. “No. You’d fall to your knees beside the person and try to stop the bleeding. I know you, James. With shaking hands you’d repeat
sorry
to them until they thought it was the only word left in the English language. You’d send for a doctor with your own money and visit them for weeks after while they mended. Whether you meant to stab them would matter little to you, because you had done it even though it had not been your intent.”

James sighed. “I still don’t know why you have me recklessly swinging a knife around in some kitchen, but if it makes you feel better, I will locate Miss Prisimon tomorrow and apologize. You have my word.” He offered his arm. “And now for that chess rematch.”

But Ellen declined, claiming a sudden ache in her head. She darted to her bedroom long before normal, all the while biting back a laugh. Who said James got to have all the fun?

After making sure to secure her door, Ellen dropped to her knees and fished the hidden bundle of clothes from under her bed. She’d filched a mobcap and apron from the servant’s clothesline after dinner. They would pair with the shabby dress lent to her after her fall from the
S.S. Gondola
. If straight-edge James could pass for a drummer, Ellen could no doubt be mistaken for a maid.

Her muscles shook as she lifted the window Lewis entered through yesterday. A final dash back to her wardrobe to grab a shawl, and then Ellen flung her legs over the edge of the sill. She took a deep breath before scurrying down the drainpipe Lewis must have used as well.

Feet on the ground, she ducked along the edge of the house. Now she only needed to wait for James to emerge.

As time passed, the air chilled, and she shivered. The eight o’clock shuffle of traffic still surged down the street. In a city like Chicago, the people never seemed to sleep.

Moments later, James appeared on the street, clad in dark, moving with his signature long stride. Staying close to the shadows, Ellen trailed him down the tree-lined avenue on hasty feet clad in her patent leather boots. Okay, so the boots screamed
not-a-maid
, but stealing a servant’s only shoes, even for one night, seemed out of the question.

Hat pulled low, James hopped aboard a cable car, and Ellen followed. Keeping her head down, she found a seat in the back of the vehicle near a cluster of tired workers. The people smelled like onions and sweat. Ellen turned, taking small breaths through her mouth. James stood near the front, hanging onto a suspended bar. With his free hand he yanked out his watch, muttered, put it back away, then yanked out his watch again.

Her palms grew damp as the cable car whizzed through an intersection. Despite that, a proud feeling of independence surged within, fortifying her. Aunt Louisa may not be able to handle common transport but Ellen Ingram could.

Goodness, Ellen might even be able to prove a woman could do more than marry a Chicago blueblood. What if she—not James—cracked the anarchist ring? Maybe Lewis would finally be pleased with her.

Maybe he’d come home.

Ellen shadowed James as he changed cable cars twice. With a hard swallow, she handed over her last coin. How would she travel back home? What if James took another cable car? She wouldn’t be able to follow. She’d be lost in the rough side of the city.
Alone.

Perhaps independence wasn’t all that wonderful after all.

Clamping her hands together, she tried to stop them from shaking. She’d come to Chicago to find herself a home. Not to solve crimes she didn’t even understand. She’d lost focus on her goal so easily, and now she had no choice but to continue trailing James tonight.
Stupid Ellen.

“Keep a move on, lady.” The attendant jerked his head, and Ellen shuffled to the back.

The farther she traveled from her aunt’s house, the faster her heart beat. The smells of the city changed from the damp marsh air near the Danby’s home to something pungent and foul.

One time, Ellen had walked in on their cook back in Wheaton hacking apart a dead chicken. The wind on this end of Chicago carried the same dead chicken smell, but more intensified. Like the chicken carcass had been left in the sun for eight days.

Her eyes watered.

At the fourth stop, James exited the car, and Ellen followed. Tenement houses sagged on either side of the street, the wind whistled in and out of holes in the ceilings. Even though night and soot blanketed the buildings, thin bare-footed children played in the street and adults sat on the broken, wooden walkway slats. Men smoked as women visited together.

“Spare something for a poor man?” An old rogue staggered against her and Ellen whirled away. She wanted to scream for James to slow down. But if he’d been upset that she came along to Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show, he’d disown her for chasing him now. He could never know she’d come tonight.

She fought against the tears that sprang to her eyes.

Reeling, her boots sank deep into a river of sludge seeping from an alley that smelled like an outhouse. When she yanked her feet out of the brown mire they made a sucking sound. With a grumble, she hurried after James.

He crossed a rickety bridge teetering over the Chicago River. She grabbed the railing, in fear for her life, and startled when she heard a water-slapping sound below. Squinting, Ellen made out the shapes of legs and heads of dead animals clogging the river. Waste from the nearby meat district. Hundreds of fish smacked over each other in an eating frenzy and scattered droplets of putrid water onto the hem of her dress.

An acidic taste filled her throat.

She glanced over her shoulder. People lived near such filth? The children drank this polluted water? No wonder she kept reading about typhoid and tuberculosis outbreaks among the poor. She wanted to wrench off her boots and go back to the row of tenement homes and give the precious leather to the first overworked woman she encountered. Seeing the divide in society made a hollow ache pull in her stomach. Sure, she’d read news articles about the growing unrest of the laborers, but before tonight she’d never considered their side.

If whatever the anarchists did coupled with helping these people in poverty, maybe they were right and James was in the wrong. And where did Lewis fit into everything? He would rise to help the unfortunate, wouldn’t he?

James turned down a street and Ellen followed. Light spilled out of crowded, rundown buildings that lined the area. People milled the walkway in groups, and the raucous laughter of men set Ellen on edge. She passed three women painted with rouge wearing indecent dresses.

Skirting a doorway, Ellen bumped against a man.

He latched onto her arm, then grabbed her chin between his fingers. “Well now, look at this poppet. I could use another lass like you at the upstairs establishment I run.”

“I’m not looking for employment.” Ellen shoved against him.

His breath rolled over her. It smelled stronger than the brandy Uncle Garrett kept on the sideboard at home. “It’ll pay better than whatever you’re doing now. Promise you that. I take care of my girls.

“Let me go.”

His hold tightened. “I’d like to take care of you right now if you’d just come along.”

Ellen peeked over the man’s broad shoulder and watched James filter through a crowd and cut down an alley. Bravery born from fear took control of her actions as she jammed the heel of her boot onto the toe of the inebriated man’s shoe.

He yelped and released her. Her breath came fast. Taking advantage of his pain, she circled him as he hopped on one foot and then she jogged after James.

Darkness swallowed her vision in the alley. She blinked to adjust her eyes. Walking forward, she splayed her hands in front of her and felt along the wall. Footsteps sounded behind Ellen, and she ducked to the ground. A group of three men shuffled past.

“The back entrance is here somewhere. Either of you seen the door?” A man spoke with an unfamiliar accent.

“Why does he insist we keep meeting here? Isn’t some lousy church meeting tonight?”

“Rat Palace. You know, I’ve never heard a place more aptly named.” Another scoffed.

A loud creak announced they’d found the door. Ellen inched closer.
Now to get inside
. If only she could locate James. Did he huddle nearby?

Something snapped behind her and footfalls came so quickly she couldn’t think, let alone react. Before she could scream a gloved hand muffled her mouth. In an instant a bag smelling like oats came over her head and strong arms hauled her backwards.

Chicago, Present Day

Even though it was morning, the hallway to her apartment building smelled of curry and cooking spices. Whitney extended her hand, accepting the keys from her neighbor. “I’ll only use your car if there’s an emergency.”