Chapter Thirty-Two
NOVEMBER
Damien doesn’t come home all night. He’s never done that before, and I have never felt more lonely or frightened. I lie awake, jumping at every sound in the neighbourhood. Is he all right?
To distract myself, I try to read Mr. Carboni’s book, but the numbers still make little sense.
What interests me is the small brass key tucked in the pocket at the back of the book.
’Tis nothing like my master keys and even less like the guest keys.
Much smaller, and it has no markings on it at all.
Like a key from a tired old house, even.
But I cannot imagine Mr. Carboni having a house old and tired enough to fit that key.
When I cannot stay awake a moment longer, I tuck the book under the mattress and swear not to touch it ever again.
In the morning, I break my own promise. I cannot resist checking on it one more time, though nothing has changed.
When I go downstairs. Damien is not waiting for me outside. I don’t understand.
From an alley one block from the hotel, I hear his loud whisper. “Rosie!”
I peer into the darkness and spot him behind a pile of garbage, waiting for me. I make sure no one is watching, then I dash down the alley and duck beside him.
“Where have you been?” I demand, beyond relieved.
“You can’t go to work,” he tells me. There’s something about his voice I can’t place.
“But I have to.”
He pulls a rolled-up newspaper from inside his coat. “You’re done at the hotel, Rosie. Me and you both.”
The headline is about the Crash, which is still ripping the world apart. Directly beneath that is a smaller headline: MURDER AT THE DOMINION.
“Read this, Rosie.” He points at the article beneath, then he reads it out loud.
“ ‘The body of Mrs. Geraldine Evans, a widow and the former head chambermaid of the Dominion Hotel, was discovered in the garbage behind the hotel yesterday. She had been shot to death. As of yet, there is no known motive or suspect. Toronto’s very own “Capone,” Marco Carboni, was taken in by police for questioning; however, he was released shortly after with no charges laid. Mr. Carboni denied all charges and said there were a lot of other considerations to be made.’ ”
LOVERS ON THE RUN: DID PASSION LEAD TO MURDER?
“What’s this?” I point out the offensive words, snuck in under a smaller headline.
Damien twists his mouth to the side and nods unhappily.
“… take a look at her top chambermaid, Rosie Ryan.”
“What?!”
“Shh. Keep reading.”
I feel ill.
“She’s a sneaky little thing, and she’s been gunning for her boss’s job all along. If you ask around, several people have heard them arguing. Maybe Miss Ryan was in cahoots with her fiancé, Damien Walsh, who is nothing but a waiter and a thief.”
I drop my hands. “Me and Mrs. Evans never argued! We never did! And you’re no thief!”
Damien is staring at the article. His face is white as a sheet. “God preserve us, we must have ticked him off, Rosie. He’s come out swinging. Looks like me and you are the prime suspects now. Carboni has a lot of cops in his pocket. They’ll be coming after us.”
My heart is beating out of my chest. “But Mr. Carboni must have killed her. Or… or… Mr. Hargrove, do you know him? Fat old man with a different prostitute every night, always yelling at the chambermaids. When Mrs. Evans defended us, that man almost struck her. Sure, and I saw it all. What about that awful Mrs. Winsome, that woman who wears pink all the time and is as thin as the feather on her hat? Everyone in the lobby heard her yell at Mrs. Evans. ’Twas as good as a threat when she said people like Mrs. Evans get what they deserve. I was right there.”
“Don’t matter now, Rosie. It’s me and you that Carboni pointed at. He’s in charge. He always is.”
My chest is squeezing. “What do we do?”
“We’re getting outta here. The cops’ll be on our doorstep any minute. I got all my money with me. We gotta go now.”
“Now?” My heart is pounding in my throat. “I need my money as well, like Mr. Carboni’s ten dollars. Can’t we go quick? I’ll grab it from under the bed.”
“We’ll go and get whatever you need, then we’ll get on a bus. Saints preserve us, we gotta get out of his reach. Today.”
I feel dizzy. ’Tis not the baby in my belly that has me out of sorts, but the rest of it.
We’re like fish in a net, caught up in this terrible mess.
Damien leads me down an alley I haven’t seen before, and I follow blindly.
He knows the back ways from when he was a lad.
Somehow he gets us home, and we stop across the street from my apartment, out of sight.
“What are we meant to do now?”
“Mother of God, Rosie. Anyone could have read the paper by now,” he whispers. “We’ve no time. Ready?”
We tear across the street and up the stairs, then we drop onto our bed like stones. I’m puffing so hard I almost choke. Sweat drips down my face.
“We didn’t kill anyone! This is awful! I would never, ever have killed Mrs. Evans! She was grand to me. She hired me, and she stood up to Mr. Carboni for me. She tried to protect me. Oh, Damien!”
Damien regards me with an odd tilt to his head. “Did you do something yesterday to make him mad? Because all of a sudden, he’s after the two of us. Faith, I don’t think he’d much noticed us before.”
I’m suddenly overcome with guilt. I swallow hard, cutting off the sobs, because now I know ’tis all my fault.
“Holy God,” I say with a sniff. “I did, Damien. I didn’t mean to, but see, I… I went to clean his room when he was at the police station, but he got back quicker than I expected, and he caught me there. He asked me if I’d seen his gun—”
“And you had! You told me about that. What did you say?”
“I swore I never saw it, but I don’t think he believed me.
Doesn’t matter, because I never touched it.
Anyhow, he told me the gun was missing, and that I was the only one near it but him and his thugs.
I’m not to blame for it being gone. I’ve no idea where it might be.
” I stand up and reach under the mattress, sick with dread.
“But, Damien, I’ve something worse to show you. ”
I hold out the little book.
“What’s this?”
“It’s Mr. Carboni’s diary. I know how much he paid to buy buildings and warehouses, I know he transferred his money out of banks before the Crash, and I know what folks owed him.
I even know how much he paid you for your deliveries.
” I swallow as he takes the book from me, stunned.
“Bianca is on the list, too, the stupid girl, and Mrs. Evans. The first time I saw the list, last week it was, he was planning to file a grievance against her. It also said he was going to ‘solve’ her. Well, now she’s dead, and when I looked at the list yesterday, she was crossed out.
The thing of it is, Damien, I think he really did ‘solve’ her. ”
Damien starts turning pages. “Rosie, how come you got this?”
I tilt my head back so I’m staring at the ceiling, with its blackened beams. “When he got back from the police station, I was still reading it. I’d no time to put it back where it belonged, so I shoved it down my uniform.
Oh, Damien,” I say, and he looks up from the book.
“The man never leaves me alone. He’s like a dog, isn’t he?
He corners me, watches me.” I curl my lip, disgusted.
“He pants over me like a dog as well, if I’m honest. And when he asked me about you—”
“He asked about me?”
“He did, and I said we were engaged. He was fair raging at that. He asked if I’d leave you if he offered me the world.
” I see the hard flex of Damien’s jaw. “I told him no. I’ll never leave you, Damien.
Then I got out of there. As soon as he noticed the notebook was gone, he must have put you and me in the headlines. ”
I see the moment when it all comes together for Damien, and grim determination sets into his face. He puts his hands on my cheeks and kisses my lips softly, then he rests his brow against mine.
“I wish you’d told me he was frightening you,” he says quietly.
The words twist in my heart. “I couldn’t, Damien. I didn’t want to even mention you because I feared he’d come after you. You’re all that matters to me.” I swallow. “Granny taught me to be tough when I need to be. He frightened me, sure, but not enough for me to put you in danger.”
He sighs. “I’m meant to be there for you, Rosie. I’m meant to take care of you.”
“You do,” I assure him. “You’re taking care of me now.”
His green eyes look straight into mine. “Aye. I am, and I will. Everything changes for me and you today. I’ll keep you safe. Grab what you need, and we’ll go. He’ll not bother you again, Rosie.”
I drop under my bed to pull my money box from its hiding spot, and I hand it to him.
He has his own little bag inside his coat pocket, and now he pours my money into it, keeping all we have next to his heart.
I rush around and collect a few clothes, though I haven’t much to worry about.
When I think I’m done, I grab the photograph of all of us chambermaids, standing at attention beside Mrs. Evans, and I slip it into his bag.
It feels like forever since that day. I remember how special I felt, standing next to her, staring at the camera.
Then her giving each chambermaid her own copy, well, it feels like another lifetime.
Damien gives me the photograph taken of the waiters, and I stuff it into a sack with the rest. The last thing to go in is the black leather book.
I take a deep breath. “I’m ready.”
That’s when the building’s door crashes open and boots stomp up the stairs. I fear the police have arrived, but in the next instant, Bianca bursts into our room, her face red as a tomato and slick with tears. She has a bag slung over her shoulder.
“Help me!” she cries.
We stare at her in confusion.
“I’m sorry, Bianca. We can’t help anyone,” I tell her. “We’re leaving.”
“I know,” she sobs. “I know. I saw your names in the paper. I knew you’d run. That’s why I came.”
“You don’t want to run with fugitives,” Damien says flatly. “That’d be stupid.”
“You don’t understand. I have to come with you. Please, please take me. You can have all my money. Here. Take it.”
We stare at my old friend, watching her expression change over and over, returning to one of pure misery. At last, she sucks in all her tears and braces herself.
“It was me,” she declares weakly.
We say nothing, because we’ve no clue what she’s on about. At last, she heaves a shuddering breath and pulls Mr. Carboni’s gun from her bag. We step back, stunned.
“Bianca!” Damien exclaims.
“It was an accident!” she cries. “Mr. Carboni, he ain’t letting up on me and that loan, Rosie.
He wants me to go to Montreal and work it off, but, Rosie, you know I’ll never, ever do that.
But if I run, he said he’ll find me and my father.
Carboni threatened to kill him! So I snuck into his room and found his gun, since you told me you saw it there.
Then I went looking for him. He was standing in a back hallway, arguing with Mrs. Evans.
Nobody saw me there, and I… I thought I could shoot him easy, but my hands were shaking, and I…
” She gasps. “Oh God, Rosie, it was awful. I missed, and then she… dropped. He looked down at her, then back at me, then he ran off. I killed her, Rosie. It was me. I killed Mrs. Evans.”