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Authors: Anna Loan-Wilsey

Tags: #Mystery, #Historical

A Lack of Temperance (17 page)

BOOK: A Lack of Temperance
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“Nellie,” I said as I fastened my corset, “do you know that gentleman in the bath? I met him before, but didn’t catch his name.”
I’d asked more questions in the few days since arriving in Eureka Springs than I had since autumn began. But what was I doing asking about this man? He had nothing to do with Mrs. Trevelyan. It seemed indulging my curiosity was becoming habit forming.
“I can check for you, miss.”
I joined her, when I finished dressing, in the waiting area, a narrow hall consisting of a wooden desk, a coatrack, and a yellow-flowered settee. Nellie stood behind the desk, poring over a registration book.
“No wonder you overlapped,” Nellie said. “The men’s baths are full, and obviously overflowing.” The male attendant slipped into the waiting room from a side door. “Fred, you shouldn’t have scheduled any treatment until two.”
“What are you doing?” Fred blustered. He grabbed the book and slammed it shut. “Treatments are confidential.” He stalked away with the registration book tucked under one arm.
“Did you happen to catch the man’s name?” I asked my attendant.
Nellie glowered toward Fred’s retreating figure. “Sorry, miss, but no.”
 
“I’ll give you ten minutes with the prisoner, Miss Davish, but no more.” Officer Burke, more sympathetic toward me since the discovery of Mrs. Trevelyan’s body, led me toward the cell block. “And don’t tell the chief I let you in.” I promised.
After my baths, I’d been in the mood for some window shopping and a roundabout stroll back to the hotel. As I’d been leaving Mrs. Cunningham’s millinery shop, I’d seen Mary Flannagan. I had waved to her. She didn’t acknowledge me but instead had ducked around a corner. Something in her behavior propelled me to follow. I kept her in my sights as I descended a flight of stairs until a gig driving past on the street below prevented me from catching up. She disappeared down another stairway. By the time I’d descended the second flight of stairs, she was nowhere to be seen. I plopped down on the bottom stair.
Was Mary purposely avoiding me? Why? Could Miss Lucy be right that Mary wasn’t to be trusted? Was Walter the only one in this town who was who he appeared to be? How much more of this could I take?
I had stood up, brushed my dress off, and straightened my hat. No longer content with the distractions of window shopping, I wanted answers. Being in the vicinity of the jailhouse, I had decided to start here; I’d confront George Shulman once and for all.
“Mr. Shulman, someone’s here to see you,” Burke announced before he left.
George Shulman leapt to his feet. “My darling, again? You shouldn’t . . .” He stopped mid-sentence when he saw me. “Who are you? What do you want?”
My darling?
I wondered. So someone else had been to visit him. I’d have to ask Walter about George Shulman’s known family or attachments.
“We met Tuesday evening outside your saloon, Mr. Shulman. I’m Miss Davish, Mrs. Trevelyan’s secretary.”
“Oh, yeah, I remember you. You’re the prim and prissy lady who was asking a lot of questions and made some nasty insinuations.” He plunked down hard onto wooden plank bench. “What are you doing here?”
“I’d like to talk to you about Edwina Trevelyan.”
“There’s nothing to talk about. I didn’t kill that woman. I’m not sorry she’s dead, but I didn’t do it.”
“Dr. Grice believes you,” I said. “I think Chief Jackson wants to believe you. But there’s a great deal of evidence against you.”
“I didn’t do it.”
“You claimed to be at the saloon all day, but a witness saw you threatening Mrs. Trevelyan the morning she died. They heard glass breaking. Glass was found in her scalp, Mr. Shulman,” I said.
George Shulman blanched. “Someone saw me?”
“And telephoned the police.”
“Well, I did threaten the old cow. She’d almost ruined my business. Sure I gave her a piece of my mind, but I didn’t kill her.”
“What about the glass?” I said.
“A mirror. I smashed a mirror. Those crazy women broke every mirror and window in my place. It was a little payback.”
“So you hit Mrs. Trevelyan with a mirror?”
“No! I broke it against the dresser.”
“Did you hit her with a gin bottle then?”
“No! I never laid a finger on the old hag. She deserved a good beating, especially after threatening to finish what she started with my bar. But that’s when I got out of there, before I really got mad.”
“When was this?” I said.
“I don’t know. The police asked me the same thing. I don’t know. Sometime in the morning, I don’t remember. The lady was very much alive. I swear.”
“Mr. Shulman, you are hot-tempered and impulsive, and you threatened to kill Mrs. Trevelyan if you ever saw her again. Why should anyone believe you?”
“Because I didn’t do it!” He rattled the iron bars with his fists in frustration.
Officer Burke appeared. “What’s all the racket?”
I ignored the policeman and approached the bars. “Mr. Shulman, did you push me down the stairs?”
“What? What are you talking about?” the saloonkeeper said.
“The night we met and argued, someone pushed me down a darkened alley stairwell not far from your bar. I believe it was to stop me from asking questions about Mrs. Trevelyan. I want to know, was it you?”
“I didn’t push you down any stairs, lady.”
“You said yourself you didn’t like me asking questions and making insinuations.”
“Listen here, lady, if I’d wanted to harm any woman, it would’ve been that Mrs. Trevelyan. Would’ve been but wasn’t. She insulted me, threatened me, tried to burn down my business, forbid me to—” He stopped short, shaking his head. “I’d every right to, but I didn’t. As for you, if you were a man I would’ve knocked you down, with one punch, right then and there in the street. But I don’t go sneaking around and I don’t harm women. Get her out of here, Burke.”
He threw himself onto the bench, his head in his hands, staring at the floor. I wanted to ask him more, but the stubborn, gruff man was finished talking.
“Shouldn’t have let you in,” Officer Burke muttered as he escorted me out of the cell block. “Chief said you’d be trouble.”
C
HAPTER
19
THE WESTERN UNION TELEGRAPH COMPANY
NUMBER
69
SENT BY
TW
REC’D BY
HF
CHECK
24 paid
RECEIVED
at
No. 2 Arcadia Hotel Eureka Springs Nov 11
1892
Dated:
Galena, Illinois   7:37am
To:
Hattie Davish   Arcadia Hotel
 
Heard about Edwina Trevelyan, not satisfied with information. Daily update required, relying on your usual discretion, efficiency. If already engaged, cancel, all arranged
 
A Windom-Greene
“T
elegram for you, Miss Davish,” the desk clerk shouted as I crossed the hotel’s rotunda. Normally very restrained, his boisterousness alarmed me. “It’s marked urgent.”
I hastened over to the registration desk to take the pink slip from the clerk’s waving hand, a profusion of possibilities racing through my mind. The last telegram I’d received marked urgent had brought me to my present predicament.
“It arrived this morning; we’ve been trying to reach you all day,” the clerk said.
I scanned the telegram’s contents quickly, almost giggling in relief. Sir Arthur was at it again. I reassured the anxious clerk with a smile before reading the contents more carefully a second time.
As always, my reaction to his telegram was mixed; this hadn’t been the first time Sir Arthur Windom-Greene had dictated “If already engaged, cancel” to a telegraph operator. On one hand, Sir Arthur was personable and generous with his vast fortune; on the other, he was a man used to getting what he wanted, when he wanted it. I’d worked on several projects for him and had found him to be a stimulating and rewarding employer. However, his recommendations often compelled me to work in more trying or tedious situations, such as the one I found myself in now. I owed my present position in society to his patronage and didn’t begrudge him his demand for absolute loyalty and acquiescence. However, it’d been his influence that had brought me to Eureka Springs and now, at his insistence, I was obliged to stay.
“It says here that arrangements have been made. Can I assume they relate to my accommodations? I was to check out tomorrow,” I said.
Annoyance marked the clerk’s countenance. “I’ve been anxious all day on account of your telegram, Miss Davish. Are you telling me that it merely concerned an extension of your stay?”
“It would seem so.” The clerk stared blankly at me. “I’m sure, Mr. Oxnard, you’ve encountered many influential people such as Sir Arthur here in the hotel.”
“Yeah,” he said.
“So you must know how they tend to approach everything with a sense of urgency. If I’d known Sir Arthur was going to contact me, I would’ve been more diligent in checking for messages. I apologize if you had any anxiety on my account.”
“Some people,” he said, shaking his head.
“Am I correct about my bill?”
With a deep sigh, he checked his registration log. “Yes, funds were wired under the name of Windom-Greene and have been credited to your room, Miss Davish.”
“Thank you, Mr. Oxnard. Would you point me in the direction of the telegraph office, please?”
The telegraph office was a tiny room off the hotel’s main lobby. The operator, a young man with shaggy brown hair, wearing a bow tie and tan jacket with “H. Floyd” stitched over the left breast pocket, was bent over a telegraph machine on a desk littered with telegrams, ledgers, and teacups. His uniform cap lay on top of a pile.
“Be just a moment,” he said, continuing to tap on the key.
As I waited for the operator to finish his task, I glanced at the telegram in my hand. At once I was struck by its similarity to the one I’d received from Mrs. Trevelyan and by the irony of Mrs. Trevelyan’s own sense of urgency. Despite her well-laid plans, mine might have been the last telegram she’d sent. Did I arrive too late? I still wondered if I could’ve prevented her death. What if I had arrived earlier? Pushing the thought out of my head, I wrote a quick response to Sir Arthur, my “new” employer.
“Not urgent, is it?” the operator said congenially. I had the uncomfortable feeling he’d been standing at the window, watching me, for several moments. I was about to say no, then changed my mind.
“Actually, he is expecting a prompt response. It isn’t urgent, but if you could send it in a timely manner, I’d appreciate it.”
“Of course, that’s what they all say.” The telegraph operator took my note and payment and glanced over the message quickly. “Nice handwriting, lady.” He walked back to his desk. “You should see some of the scrawl I get. Most of the time I can barely make it out.”
I understood exactly what he meant. I have spent countless hours deciphering the illegible handwriting of my employers, with Sir Arthur being one of the worst offenders. It confounded me how a man like Sir Arthur, so meticulous in his research, could be so slovenly in his handwriting. But then again, I was grateful for it; that’s one of the reasons why he had hired me.
“Do you often get requests for urgent telegrams?” I said.
“Sure, you’d be surprised what some folks call urgent news.” He began tapping rapidly on the telegraph machine.
“How about the ladies of the temperance coalition?” I asked.
“I’ve definitely wired more ‘urgent’ messages since they’ve been in town,” Mr. Floyd said.
“Did Mrs. Trevelyan, the club’s president, send a lot of ‘urgent’ messages? Or a lot of telegrams in general?”
His fingers slipped on the telegraph key. “Oh no, I misspelled Davish. I keyed a second
v
instead of an
h
.”
“Don’t worry,” I said. “He’ll know who it’s from.”
“As long as you don’t mind. . . .” He continued typing in silence. When he finished, he stamped a receipt with the date and time and handed it to me. He leaned forward through the service window and peeked around.
“You’re talking about the dead woman, right?” He pulled out his log book. “She always had an urgent message to send. And lots of them.”
“Did she send one Saturday or Sunday to something called the Salvation Army?” I said.
“Doesn’t ring a bell. What’s a Salvation Army?”
“It’s a charity Mrs. Trevelyan supported. Could you tell me if she sent or received any telegrams last weekend?”
He flipped through his log book. A lopsided grin spread across his face. “I see an urgent telegram from Mrs. Trevelyan to a Miss Hattie Davish on Friday, the fourth.” I grimaced at his attempt at a jest. “Sorry.” He blushed and quickly examined the ledger again. “She sent several Saturday morning and two Sunday afternoon. Nothing to the Salvation Army.”
“Could you give me a list?” I said.
“Ah, I don’t know. I could get fired.”
“Could you at least tell me if anything was wired to or from Mr. John Martin?”
He paused, regarded me for a moment, then returned his glance to the ledger.
“I don’t see any John Martin. She sent a telegram to someone with the same initials as John Martin though, a Joseph Mascavarti.”
“Joseph Mascavarti? Are you sure?”
“Yeah.” He pivoted the log around and pointed. “See for yourself.”
Joseph Mascavarti, Elmwood House, 9 :18, 7 Nov 1892 Mrs. E. Trevelyan
. He turned the log to face him again.
“This was wired Monday morning,” I exclaimed.
“Oh, sorry, you only wanted to know about the weekend days, didn’t you.”
“Oh my goodness, Mr. Floyd, don’t apologize. This is extremely helpful. Now think, can you remember who requested this telegram? I’ve been told that Mrs. Trevelyan usually sent her secretary or a chambermaid down with the request.”
Again he consulted his log and hesitated, elucidation dawning on his face. “Oh boy, I remember now. Mrs. Trevelyan brought it herself.” He looked up with horror in his eyes. “I was one of the last people to see her alive, wasn’t I?”
“Yes. Now tell me everything you remember, Mr. Floyd.”
He remembered it distinctly. Mrs. Trevelyan had wanted to wire someone in town. It was highly unusual to wire anything locally and he had told her so. He’d tried to convince her to use the mail, or if she was in a hurry, to have the message hand-delivered; the Arcadia Hotel provided such a service. Or why not use the telephone? But she had insisted, saying nothing but a telegram would command the immediate attention she desired.
I leaned closer to the operator through the window and lowered my voice. “Do you remember what the telegram said?”
His hands quivering, Mr. Floyd shook his head, then proceed to rifle through a filing cabinet. After an unfathomable amount of time, he pulled a slip of paper from the files.
“I don’t know why I’m showing you this. I’m gonna get fired.” He set the slip down reverently between us on the window shelf.
This time, I was the one to glance over my shoulder to assure we were unobserved.
THE WESTERN UNION TELEGRAPH COMPANY
NUMBER
5
SENT BY
HF
REC’D BY CHECK
14 paid
RECEIVED
    at
Nov 7
1892
Dated:
Arcadia Hotel Eureka Springs 9:18am
To:
J. Mascavarti   Elmwood House
 
Contribution received with insufficient funds expect additional response
Mrs. E. Trevelyan
The operator and I regarded each other in silence. “What does it mean?” he said.
It meant that Mrs. Trevelyan had died somewhere between 9:18
A.M.
and 11:00
A.M.
, and that Joseph Mascavarti, whose initials were the second to match the menacing note I’d found among Mrs. Trevelyan’s papers, had received the last telegram Mrs. Edwina Trevelyan would ever send.
“I’m not certain,” I said. “But it may have something to do with Mrs. Trevelyan’s murder.”
The wording of the telegram and the fact that Mrs. Trevelyan had personally requested it could leave little doubt that Joseph Mascavarti was a victim of Mrs. Trevelyan’s blackmail. And isn’t blackmail a motive for murder? But if this was true, then Joseph Mascavarti, and not John Martin, was the one with the motive to kill.
Could it be merely a coincidence that both men share the same initials?
I wondered as the operator whisked the telegram away.
Bolstered now that I knew where to find at least one of the mysterious J.M.’s, I said, “Are you sure you can’t give me the list from this weekend too?”
Without hesitating, he pulled the log book closer and scribbled onto a scrap sheet of paper, looking up several times to see he wasn’t being watched. He scrutinized the lobby one more time before he slipped it to me. I glanced down at the paper in my hand. In his haste, he had written down everything that had been wired over the weekend, not only those from Mrs. Trevelyan. A few familiar names caught my eye. I folded the paper and slipped it into the pocket of my skirt.
“Thank you, Mr. Floyd. You’ve been most helpful.” I stepped away from the telegraph office window and headed slowly back to my room.
It was a surprisingly long list with telegrams sent from three doctors, two local businessmen, and numerous hotel guests. In addition to Mrs. Trevelyan, several temperance club members had wired messages that weekend: Cordelia Anglewood to a jeweler in Fayetteville, Agnes Kiltcher to a Mrs. Boone in Jonesboro, and Mrs. Elmslie, an elderly lady staying in the room across the hall from me, to Mr. Elmslie in Joplin.
“I said wait, Miss Davish!” a harsh voice commanded.
I stopped in my tracks. I’d been contemplating the assortment of telegrams when I nearly bumped into Cordelia Anglewood.
“Get your head out of the clouds, girl. Now, if you recall,” she said, “you agreed to write responses to all of the condolence cards. I was about to leave these at the desk, but . . . here are several more.” She thrust the cards and some leaflets at me. “And as your obligations and commitments are at an end tomorrow, it behooves you to have them completed by then. The signed temperance pledges are there too.”
Taken aback by her businesslike manner, I stood speechless as she, not expecting a reply, turned to leave. I found my voice, but stammered. “I spoke to the stable boy. . . .”
She halted, then faced me, glowering. Her hand brushed her bare throat, smoothed her hair, then twirled the gold stud in her right ear. “Mine wasn’t an idle threat, Miss Davish,” Cordelia Anglewood said in an eerily calm voice. “I am trying to lead this coalition and serve its cause. For no apparent reason, you seem intent on undermining my endeavors with your petty insinuations. You’ve been nothing but an insolent, incompetent pest since you arrived.” She leaned forward, causing me to lean back slightly. Her voice was almost a whisper. “Once and for all, I’d nothing to do with Trevelyan’s demise. But if you don’t stay out of my way, and out of my business, I won’t be able to say the same about you.”
BOOK: A Lack of Temperance
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