A Lack of Temperance (14 page)

Read A Lack of Temperance Online

Authors: Anna Loan-Wilsey

Tags: #Mystery, #Historical

BOOK: A Lack of Temperance
7.82Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
I ignored her remark. “You delivered the message Sunday night, then? Or was it Monday morning?”
“Josephine, what are you doing?” a voice snapped.
We turned to see Cordelia Anglewood, in full riding gear, the diamond collar pin less lustrous under the electric lights, standing in the library doorway. She glowered at me.
“Are you still here? Now that your services are no longer required, I thought you would’ve packed your bags and returned to wherever it is you came from. In fact,” she sneered, “since Trevelyan was dead before you arrived, you never were required, were you?”
“I’ve served Mrs. Trevelyan since the moment I arrived Sunday afternoon, Mrs. Anglewood. If you will remember, Mrs. Trevelyan was still very much alive. And I’m still working for her, albeit in a different capacity.”
“You’re still being paid, you mean.”
“No, that isn’t what I mean, though I have been paid through the end of the week.”
“And then you intend to leave?”
“I’ve yet to decide when I will leave.”
“Ah, I see you’ve finally relinquished all of Trevelyan’s correspondences.” She strode into the room and snatched the papers from Mrs. Piers. “Good. Since you’re still being paid to serve the AWTC president, I’ll return to you anything of a personal nature to which you may respond, including all condolences. And I have a stack of temperance pledges that need to be typed up.”
“Mrs. Anglewood, I don’t work for you,” I said.
“I can tend to the condolences, Cordelia,” Mrs. Piers said.
“No, Josephine, you must help me. This woman has been paid and will finish her job. Won’t you, Miss Davish?”
“Sister Cordelia is our acting president now, Miss Davish,” Josephine Piers said, patting my shoulder. “We all must do as she bids, and serve in the ways she sees fit.”
“Very well,” I conceded, sensing an opportunity. The condolence letters, at least, might reveal something useful. “For Mrs. Trevelyan’s sake.”
A smirk crawled across Cordelia’s face. “And I’ll need to approve all responses before anything is posted.” She flicked two fingers in the air. “Come, Josephine, we have work to do.”
I followed the two women as they left the library.
“By the way, Mrs. Anglewood, I know you told the police you were out riding all day Monday. But why didn’t you mention you visited Mrs. Trevelyan that morning? It seems important.”
“It’s not,” Cordelia said, her back to me. “And it’s none of your business.”
“When did you see Mother Trevelyan?” Josephine asked.
“Before I went riding that morning,” Cordelia said. “But it doesn’t matter now, does it?”
“It doesn’t matter that the two of you argued?” I said. “That you raised your riding crop to her?”
Both women swung around, the velvet-trimmed hem of Mrs. Piers’s black dress swishing back and forth, and advanced toward me.
“How dare you?” Cordelia Anglewood shoved the packet of papers at the wide-eyed Josephine and backed me into the wall. She stood mere inches away, her breath hot and smelling of coffee. I turned my face aside. “How dare you imply I had something to do with Trevelyan’s murder?”
“Did you?” I whispered. She swung the riding crop above her head.
“Cordelia!” Josephine Piers lunged forward, forcing Cordelia’s arm down. She peered over her shoulder, searching for onlookers, before turning to me. “You cannot leave well enough alone, can you, Miss Davish?”
“Let go of me.” Cordelia Anglewood, seething, yanked herself free of Mrs. Piers’s grip.
“Think about the coalition, Sister Cordelia, Madame President,” Josephine Piers said, emphasizing the last word. “A typewriter girl isn’t worth the cost to our cause. If you’re so adamant about brandishing that whip, join us at the next saloon smashing.”
Cordelia Anglewood shook her crop at me. “You . . . ,” she stammered with rage, “stay out of my way.” She swiveled on her booted heel and, trailed by Mrs. Piers, stomped down the hall.
 
I have to get out of here
.
I raced through the lobby, arousing a string of astonished looks and indignant exclamations from the people I passed. I didn’t care. I swung open the French doors that led to the hotel’s eastern portico and ran. I clutched my ribs and dashed across the manicured lawns and down the hillside, tracing the same wooded path I had strolled arm in arm with Walter a short time ago. My lungs ached and I stumbled several times before I reached the safety of the cavernous Grotto Spring. Tears streamed down my face, blinding me, as I entered the dark cave and felt my way along the cold stone walls. I dropped onto the stone bench. Someone had left a white enamel cup at the end of it. I picked up the cup and flung it as hard as I could against the opposite wall. I gave in to my frustration and fear and sobbed until I couldn’t breathe.
I’d faced challenges here that I never could’ve imagined while typing manuscript pages for Sir Arthur or taking dictation for Mrs. Madeleine Kennedy. Nothing I’d learned at Mrs. Chaplin’s school had prepared me for this. In less than one week, I’d found my employer murdered, locked and suffocated in her own trunk, had been pushed down a flight of stairs, and a moment ago, had been threatened with a whipping or worse. My own dear father never raised a hand to me. I wanted to leave and have nothing more to do with the American Women’s Temperance Coalition. I wanted to erase the horrific sight of Mrs. Trevelyan’s face ashen and contorted in death from my memory.
Pull yourself together
.
Un, deux, trois . . .
It’s not like I was the one lying on a cold slab in the coroner’s office. I pulled a handkerchief from my sleeve and dabbed my eyes. But why was Mrs. Trevelyan killed? Why was I being threatened? Why was any of this happening? I tried to take a deep breath, but a sharp pain in my ribs stopped me short. Something must be done.
I picked up the enamel cup and inspected it for damage. A small chip on the rim was the only evidence of my shameful behavior. I replaced it on the bench. I knelt at the spring and splashed water on my face. I stood, brushed soil from my skirt, and readjusted my hat. A bald, middle-aged man on crutches entered the cave as I was leaving.
“Not scaring you off, am I, missy?” he said, showing a mouth full of missing teeth.
“No, no. There’s just something I have to do. Good day.”
I had never shied away from a challenge before. Why start now?
C
HAPTER
16
“D
o you have a Mr. John Martin registered here?”
All afternoon I had searched hotel after hotel, asking the same question. I had visited the Hancock House, the Wright House, and the Pence House, all popular whitewashed frame boarding houses. I had stopped at the Congress Hotel, which proved to be accommodations for black servants. I had inquired at the Lamont Hotel, the Waverly Hotel, and the grand Southern Hotel at Basin Circle Park. I had questioned clerks at hotels with names like the Josephine, the Clara Bell, and the Catherine or at others named for nearby springs, the Sweet Spring Hotel, the Magnetic Springs Hotel, and the Congress Spring Hotel. And still there were dozens left to visit. Yet every hotel clerk gave me the same answer, “No.” Exhausted, I took the streetcar up to the Thach Cottage Hotel, high up on the hill. After another disappointing inquiry, I disembarked at my hotel, the Arcadia. The same clerk who always seemed to be behind the desk was poring over a pile of ledgers.
“Excuse me, Mr. Oxnard, but could you do me one more favor?” He glanced up from his work, rolled his eyes at the sight of me, and sighed.
“What is it now, Miss Davish?”
“Could you tell me if you have a Mr. John Martin registered here?”
He slid the ledgers to one side and drew the enormous registration book in front of him. “When would he have arrived?”
I gave the same answer I’d given over and over all afternoon. “I’m not certain. I do know that he was in Eureka Springs as of last Friday.”
He flipped through the book and scanned several pages. “Sorry, no John Martin.”
“Thank you.” I would have to start again tomorrow. The clerk peered over my shoulder. I turned to see what had caught his attention.
“Davish,” Miss Lucy shouted as she and her sister proceeded across the lobby at an astonishing pace.
“Hattie, dear,” Miss Lizzie said, panting and bending at the waist, “we found you.”
“What is it?” I said. “What’s happened?”
Miss Lucy grasped my arm. “Davish, we’ve been searching all over for you. Where have you been?”
“Why, what’s wrong?”
“Oh, Hattie, dear, we have the most monumental news.” Miss Lizzie held her hand to her heaving chest. “You tell her, Lucy, I still can’t breathe.”
“Lizzie and I were right all along. Weren’t we, Lizzie?”
“What do you mean?” I said. “Miss Lucy, what are you talking about?”
“That barkeep, Davish.” She raised her chin and folded her arms across her chest. “The police arrested him a little over an hour ago. We were right. George Shulman murdered Edwina Trevelyan.”
The coach was waiting. I would’ve rather walked, but the medicine had worn off and my knee was again throbbing. Donned in my black Henrietta cloth dress, which I’d worn to my father’s funeral, and a new French saucer hat with black satin bow, black feathers, and spotted veil that I’d picked up at Mrs. Cunningham’s shop, I joined the multitude of guests ascending into the hired coaches, broughams, and Rockaways lined up in the Arcadia’s circular drive. We descended the hillside in a slow procession. I felt at odds saying farewell to a woman I’d never properly met. It was my duty, yet I felt the gesture premature. There was so much I still didn’t know.
“It’s a lovely night, isn’t it, dear?” Miss Lizzie said, sitting beside me, looking up at the sky. Miss Lucy, in a well-used black Directoire bonnet, dozed across from us.
“Yes, it is,” I said.
“So crisp and clear. Just look at those stars. With the killer caught, I imagine Edwina is up there among them now, finally at peace.”
“I hope so, Miss Lizzie. I truly hope so.”
Despite the cool air, the broad doors of the Opera House had been left open, allowing the glow of the gaslight chandeliers and the chords of the organ to spill out into the road. A parade of women streamed into the Opera House. As I helped Miss Lucy through the doors and down the center aisle, we passed women of all kinds, condoling, greeting, and mingling together. There were servants and dignitaries, Southerners and Yankees, old and young. Women held babes in their arms while others flapped fans of ostrich feathers. Some hid dresses of plain wool or cotton under hand-stitched shawls while others flaunted the puffy shoulders of a dress of crepe, silk, or taffeta. On their heads were every shape, size, and style of hat to be found in Eureka Springs. And they were all whispering about the arrest of George Shulman. I had never felt so alone.
My head was still reeling from the array of emotions that revelation had created. I was shocked and suspicious. Any relief I might’ve felt was negated by the unresolved mystery surrounding John Martin and the menacing letter. And although I myself had argued that George Shulman might’ve pushed me down the stairs, thus making him a suspect, the near-violent clash I’d experienced with Mrs. Cordelia Anglewood made me uneasy about my own rationale. Could I’ve been mistaken about my assailant? Could the police be wrong? The arrest of George Shulman alleviated me from any further duty toward Mrs. Trevelyan; I was free to leave Eureka Springs. So why did I feel regret instead of relief? Why wasn’t I packing my things right now?
After settling the Shaw sisters into their seats, I located one for myself several rows behind and scanned the crowd for familiar faces. Mary Flannagan, tears streaking down her cheeks, sat a few rows back with a group of girls I didn’t recognize. I was touched. It was the first time I’d seen her upset over Mrs. Trevelyan’s death. Scattered about in the rows in front of me, I caught glimpses of several coalition members I knew, including the schoolteacher from Memphis, Diana Halbert, who waved when our eyes met. A woman in a black toque with an entire blackbird upon it sat in front of me, blocking my view of the first several rows where the few men in attendance sat: city dignitaries, members of Mrs. Trevelyan’s family, and financial supporters of the American Women’s Temperance Coalition. I elevated myself from the arms of my chair to see above the bird on the woman’s hat and found who I was looking for; Walter sat in the third row with Judge Senrow and Chief Jackson. I was eager to talk to him, but he was too far away for me to capture his attention.
The box seats, normally reserved for special guests during theatrical productions, were empty and curtained, but the stage, overflowing with flowers and wreaths, was set up for the service. In front and center of the stage was a closed casket covered with flowers and silk AWTC banners of sky blue. A podium draped in black crepe stood off to the left with three chairs set behind it. Occupying one of the chairs was Mrs. Josephine Piers, deep in conversation with the rotund man sitting next to her. By his coat, collar, and shallow-crowned dignitaries’ hat, he had to be the officiating minister. The third seat was empty.
As the organ music faded to silence, everyone standing scrambled for a seat, except Cordelia Anglewood, who greeted and consoled those in the front row. When the music stopped altogether, she ascended the stairs and took her place at the podium.
“Gentle ladies and gentle men, we are here to remember our dearly departed friend, Edwina Ruth Trevelyan.” Bowing her head slightly, Cordelia Anglewood proclaimed, “May God rest her soul.” She lifted her head and surveyed her audience. “As her closest friend and successor, I would like to thank you all for attending this service. Let us begin with a prayer from Reverend Little.”
The minister, with a book clutched in his hand, replaced Mrs. Anglewood at the podium. Both of the women onstage bowed their heads. As I followed their lead, I couldn’t help feeling that Mrs. Piers was the more sincere of the two.
“Most merciful Father,” the minister said, reading from the Book of Common Prayer, “who hast been pleased to take unto thyself the soul of thy servant; Grant to us who are still in our pilgrimage, and who walk as yet by faith, that having served thee with constancy on earth, we may be joined hereafter with thy blessed saints in glory everlasting, through Jesus Christ our Lord,
Amen
.”
“Amen,” answered those in attendance.
“Most merciful Father—”
Before Reverend Little could add another word, Cordelia Anglewood was on her feet. The minister blinked at her and muttered something incoherent as Cordelia closed the prayer book, offered the minister her hand, and thanked him, without ever taking her eyes off the gathering. Josephine Piers rose, clasped his hands in hers, and whispered something as she guided the minister to his seat.
“As the first official act as president of the American Women’s Temperance Coalition, I move that a Resolution of Sympathy and Respect be adopted on this solemn occasion.” Without turning around, she reached out toward Josephine Piers, who placed a tablet in the new president’s hand. I wasn’t surprised to learn she’d been elected president but was amazed that Mrs. Anglewood’s first official act hadn’t been to require me to type the resolution.
“Whereas,” Cordelia Anglewood proclaimed, “it has pleased our divine leader to take our beloved friend from us; and Whereas, the family circle has been broken with few among us left untouched; and Whereas, the Coalition members feel the loss of our fellow worker; Therefore, be it Resolved that while the American Women’s Temperance Coalition does humbly bow in submission to His will, we do not the less sympathize with our esteemed colleague’s family, both by blood and by bond, in their hour of sorrow and commend them to His care; Therefore be it Resolved that this resolution be entered upon the minutes of this special meeting of the American Women’s Temperance Coalition, Eureka Springs, Arkansas, November 10, 1892.”
“Is the motion seconded?” Mrs. Anglewood said.
“I second the motion,” Josephine Piers declared before absorbing herself in the task of recording the motion in the tablet Cordelia Anglewood had passed back to her.
Is this a memorial service or a business meeting?
I wondered.
“Anyone who would like to come forward and speak on the behalf of our departed friend, please step forward.” Cordelia Anglewood beckoned for others to approach the stage.
Finally.
This was, in large part, why I’d attended the memorial service.
Dozens of men and women took the stage, each taking a few minutes to remember “Mother” Trevelyan. All who spoke praised Mrs. Trevelyan for her temperance work, her generosity, her passion, and her faith. One man, to titters and scattered applause, admitted astoundment that “the little lady could wield an ax like a lumberjack.” Mr. Charles Trevelyan Junior spoke on behalf of the family and evoked the name of his deceased sister, Ruth, whose death at the hand of her drunken husband had brought Mrs. Trevelyan to the cause. Cordelia Anglewood, as her successor, spoke more eloquently of Mrs. Trevelyan’s role as president of the coalition than I thought her capable. Josephine Piers didn’t speak at all except to say, “God’s will be done,” before bursting into tears. The minister, his hand cupping her elbow as she leaned into him, escorted her back to her chair. The evening dragged on.
I’d hoped to gain more insight into Mrs. Trevelyan’s character, her life, or her impact on the coalition and its members. I was disappointed. With the exception of her son’s revelation, I’d learned nothing new. I was relieved when the minister began to rise from his chair, indicating the night was almost over. Instead Mrs. Anglewood approached the podium.
“In closing I would like to read part of a prayer written by Dr. Alexander Griswold in support for our great cause.”
Nonplused over this breach in protocol, the minister commenced toward the podium. Josephine seized the minister’s arm and cajoled him back into his seat.
Raising her hands above her, as I’d seen her do at the Harding Spring meeting, Cordelia Anglewood prayed.
“O merciful God, help us to fulfill the duties of our respective stations in life, and to go forward in our Christian course. Give us grace to be temperate in all things, that we may live soberly and righteously. Give thy blessing, O Lord, to all who labor to suppress intemperance. Give success to their benevolent efforts, that they may be instrumental in promoting sobriety and good morals. Help each and all of us to do our duty in the state of life to which it shall please thee to call us, that we may glorify thy name, and obtain everlasting life, through our Lord and Savior.
Amen
.”
Is this a memorial service or a temperance rally?
I wondered.

Other books

Reap the Whirlwind by Terry C. Johnston
Cool Repentance by Antonia Fraser
Button Hill by Michael Bradford
Point of Knives by Melissa Scott
Amnesia by Rick Simnitt
Small Change by Elizabeth Hay