CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
D etective Gideon Day stared directly at Leona with an expression she couldn’t comprehend. Grandfather put a protective arm around her shoulders. Charlotte appeared beside her and took her hand.
“Now what?” Leona whispered.
Geneva hurried to the door of the formal parlor, a wake of well-dressed women behind her. Detective Day stood in front of a phalanx of constables, rudely pushing the butler aside with his cane.
“He didn’t use a cane before. I wonder what happened?”
“Andersonville,” her grandfather replied tersely. “Wounded at Gettysburg, taken there as a prisoner of war where it didn’t heal right. It bothers him in winter.”
Shocked, she said, “When did you speak to him?”
Grandfather turned a disbelieving expression on her. “Every day since I arrived and you told me that incredible story.”
“Well, why didn’t you tell me?” And why had he even spoken to the man who once thought she might be involved in her friend’s murder?
He muttered something about “fair’s fair,” and she frowned at him, but his eyes were on the detective.
All eyes were on the detective. Benedict Van Wyn and an older gentleman hurried forward. The constables surged into the room, and the shouting began.
“What’s—? I can’t see,” Leona said, standing on tiptoe.
“Oran, go look,” Charlotte commanded her husband.
Oran, hair so blond it was nearly white, strode into the growing mass of people, pushing his way toward the front. His height made it easy to track him. The crowd hissed and booed at the constables. Geneva, whom she could no longer see, shrieked, making Leona’s heart thump.
When Oran returned, he said, “They’re arresting Benedict.”
Charlotte gasped and covered her mouth.
“What for?” Leona asked, her stomach dropping into her slippers. Somehow, this night had gone all wrong.
“Apparently, murder,” Oran replied in a low voice. “That’s his lawyer with him, the one doing most of the shouting now. I suppose this dinner is over.” He grimaced, perhaps hearing himself. “I did miss lunch, and Geneva and Benedict always put on a good spread.”
Leona glanced around, sharp dread stabbing her. “Who is he supposed to have murdered?”
“Why, the Frosts, my dear. The police have found some kind of diary which apparently very nearly points the finger right at him.”
Several eavesdropping party guests cried out in horror and disgust.
Another calamity, but at least it wasn’t hers. What bothered her about it was she knew Benedict was an opportunist—but did that include murder? Best she separated herself from this mess and stayed home until after the new year. Or until the Spring, perhaps.
“Well, I’ve had quite enough.” Charlotte turned to her husband. “Oran, could you—”
“I want to stay,” Oran told her, taking her hand. “I feel I should as a witness to events. And in case things get out of hand. William, could you possibly see Charlotte gets home safe?”
“I’m not leaving without you.” Charlotte sighed. She turned to Leona for a brief embrace, then shook her grandfather’s hand. Oran had already wandered back to the crowd at the doorway to the formal parlor. He returned a few minutes later with their coats and helped Leona into hers.
“Well, good night.” In her heart Leona felt she should see to Geneva but knew it would be a mistake. The night felt incomplete, as if she’d prepared for a battle mere moments before the surrender.
“We’ll go out this way.” Grandfather gestured toward the doorway where a few other guests were leaving.
Leona followed him out through the door that led to the garden lying frozen in the moonlight.
A shoveled path brought them and other guests through the snow and around to the front of the house where their carriages awaited them.
A cab pulled up when Grandfather raised his arm; rather quickly, Leona was glad to see.
Grandfather gave the driver their destination and helped her into the carriage.
The dress, as beautiful as it was, hampered her movements, almost as if designed to make her helpless.
At least there were blankets to wrap up in until they arrived back at the warm house.
“This night was just not meant to be, I suppose,” Leona said.
If the Van Wyn’s fell from grace, where would that place Leona and Gil?
A selfish thought, but she had a feeling that everything she’d strived for only pushed her further back.
Gil, too, but if it weren’t for his business, she wouldn’t care so much. “I hope Gil is feeling better.”
“Gil,” her grandfather muttered. “He’d better—drat, the driver’s going in the wrong direction. Ho! You!”
He pounded on the roof of the cab to get the driver’s attention. The carriage picked up speed with the snap of the whip, jolting Leona against the seat back. She reached out and gripped the strap by the window. Her grandfather’s palpable tension alarmed her.
“What are you thinking?” she asked, her voice bobbled by the erratic pace over cobblestone streets. “Are we being kidnapped?”
“I think I’m glad I armed myself before leaving your house tonight,” he answered, and placed what she assumed was one of his pocket Navy Colts in her lap.
She couldn’t read her grandfather’s expression in the darkness of the carriage, but he obviously believed they were in danger.
Relieved, Leona took up the weapon but wondered where to put it.
She had no pockets and her wrap was only a heavy shawl of green silk.
The derringer would have been easier to hide, but she’d left it behind.
“We’ll find out what he wants when we stop. I’m too old to be leaping from moving carriages anymore.”
“Grandmother Stanbury would not be pleased if I ruined the dress, either,” she said as lightly as she could, though inside she trembled.
“When they let us out, run if you can.”
“Not without you—”
“If they’ve finally come for me, they’ll have me,” he replied heavily. “Though not without a fight.”
“I’m the better shot,” she reminded him.
“A long time ago, you were. But when was the last time you fired even the derringer?”
She was about to retort but the carriage began to slow down. Pushing the blankets away, she removed her wrap and hid the gun beneath it.
“Steady,” her grandfather said. “When he opens the door, shoot. If there’s another one behind him, I’ll take him on.”
The rush of excitement hit her like the first swallow of whiskey or the few moments after taking laudanum.
She gritted her teeth, straightened her back, and cocked the gun.
The carriage slowed to a stop. The driver came down off his perch and icy bootsteps approached the carriage door on her right.
Soft murmuring, two voices, perhaps a third, joined them.
The Colts held five shots each. Nervous sweat popped out on her brow and upper lip, and her heart pounded.
The faint echoes of a battle fought long ago gathered around her.
Cannon fire, the beat of drums, the stink of sulfur.
She shook her head to clear it away. The handle of the carriage door rattled.
The door swung open to reveal a masked man holding a half-covered lantern and a knife.
“Well, well, my lovely girl—”
“See you in hell, you bastard,” she said and squeezed the trigger.
He clutched his shoulder with a scream and fell back.
Another man took his place, reaching into the carriage to pull Leona out by the hair so quickly, Grandfather didn’t have a chance to react.
Her scalp felt on fire as two more men joined in and disarmed Leona and her grandfather with rough hands.
The man she shot lay on the ground moaning, but they ignored him.
The East River glimmered in the cold moonlight.
At least the cannons and drums had stopped.
The dark hulks of dockside warehouses lay on either side of them.
They’d been brought to the edge of the water, and her stomach clenched remembering the drowned man Helen had thought might be her husband.
Had they arrived at the same place as Henry?
As far as she could tell, the men were armed with knives and cudgels, not guns.
They all wore scarves tied around their faces to obscure their features and brimmed hats pulled over foreheads to hide their eyes.
They were likely members of one of the many gangs who roamed about Brooklyn. Their silence unnerved her.
The man who’d grabbed her by the hair, perhaps the leader, gestured to one of his fellows, who pulled a sack from his pocket. “All yer valuables in there,” he growled. “Now.”
Leona reached up and unclasped the emerald necklace, then removed the earrings.
Her grandfather pulled his gold watch and chain from his vest pocket and the diamond stickpin from his cravat.
These they placed in the sack while the young man stood in front of them.
He could not keep his hard and hot gaze from Leona as she pulled the combs from her hair.
She bared her teeth at him, her mind gone still and focused.
“Take the gloves off,” the leader snapped. “Yeah, the ring, too, missus. Think I’m an idiot?”
“It’s my wedding ring.” She’d managed to hold onto it throughout the episode with the Frosts—she was unwilling to give it up now.
“Leona,” her grandfather said in a warning tone.
“Shut up, old man. I’ll cut that finger off in half a minute, missus,” he said with a wave of his glinting knife. “Do what I say.”
She yanked at the ring and dropped it in the sack. The man she’d shot sat up, clutching his shoulder and cursing at her.
“He said they wouldn’t be armed,” he whined. “Damn, it hurts.”
“He needs a doctor,” Leona said.
“Bitch,” the man on the ground said and spat. “What’s all that see you in hell business, anyway?”
“It’s a soldiers’ saying,” the leader replied. “Shut yer mouth for once, will you?”
Leona took a deep breath. Her mind had clicked alive again. “What regiment were you with?”
The man laughed. “All of ‘em, missus.”