Band of Sisters (54 page)

“But you said they’ll discredit me no matter what I say. Isn’t Alice’s testimony enough? She knows as much about Darcy’s as I—perhaps more!”

“Your testimony will verify the partial testimonies of Alice and others. The judge and jury can’t ignore every witness, and yours ties them all together.” Curtis let out a long sigh, a deflated balloon. “If we don’t stop Belgadt and Meitland and the heads of the rings connected with them, if we don’t stop the Darcy’s front for prostitution, then they’ll do it again and again and again—if not at Darcy’s, then the same operation under another name in another location. No woman, no child, is exempt from their exploitation—immigrants or American born.”

“Like Lydia,” Maureen said, recognizing the pain in Curtis’s eyes. “Joshua told me.”

“Like Lydia,” Curtis replied, his voice breaking momentarily. “Or Dorothy—” he glanced at Olivia—“or Katie Rose.”

“Or Katie Rose,” Maureen repeated.
Will she ever speak to me again? If I do this, if I bring the shame of this public trial—this spectacle—upon us, will she disown me altogether? Would that be different from the way things stand now? Should that even matter when so much is at stake?

Maureen didn’t realize she’d been staring at Olivia as she pondered. But when she blinked, returning to the moment, the pain in Olivia’s eyes sparked a bond between them. “What about Katie Rose and Dorothy—are they in danger?”

Curtis shook his head. “I told you I’ve posted men at Meitland House, and Drake’s facing a string of charges a mile long all on his own. He’ll be locked away for years. As for Alice and the women freed, they’re under protection until they testify and are probably safer away from you.”

Maureen knew that should be a comfort. She rubbed her temples, trying to think, to sort it through.

She remembered the woman who’d saved her—the woman who’d told Joshua of the key. The woman neither she nor Joshua had been able to save.
Too late! When did she realize he couldn’t save us both? But her cry helped Joshua save me. Her cry saved my life.

Maureen closed her eyes. She remembered the board attached to the cage, number 37, the board she’d struggled to save when she could not save the woman. Testifying would not help that woman now. Testifying would mean public humiliation, possibly deportation if they twisted her words and deemed that she’d entered the country as a prostitute. But perhaps her voice could save others like her who just wanted a chance at life. This was what the insistent voice that lived inside her would do. She knew. No matter that she didn’t want to do it.

She drew a long breath. “Yes. For Lydia and Dorothy, for Katie Rose.” Her voice broke. “For number 37.”

Joshua squeezed her hand and pressed her fingers to his lips. Maureen opened her eyes and was warmed by the love and pride shining in Joshua’s. Refreshment flowed through her veins. She felt herself blush at Olivia’s openmouthed gape and the young woman’s glance of urgency between Joshua and Curtis.

“For our sisters.” Curtis raised his coffee cup in a toast.

“For all our sisters.” The toast rounded the table, though Maureen noted that Olivia’s cup barely left its saucer and that she barely sipped.

Olivia swallowed.
This is surreal. Curtis and Maureen toast with camaraderie and respect, but neither evidence the love she proclaimed for him—the love he considered he has for her.

Olivia rubbed her temples. The tension of hosting the woman Curtis loved was bearable, until they were all present in one room.
How will I do this for a lifetime?

Before Joshua left for the evening, he promised Maureen that he would check on Katie Rose.
As if he reads her mind . . . How is it that she so commands the attention of two fine men? Oh, dear Father—I’m not jealous of any attention she gives or receives from Joshua. But . . .

But then she saw him lean down and heard him whisper in the other woman’s ear, “Katie Rose’ll come round. There comes a time we each must stake our claim in life and do with it what we will, what we know God wills for us. Everything else follows.”

Olivia bit her lip.
Such good advice! Help me take that advice, Lord.

Joshua embraced Maureen lightly. Olivia felt herself stiffen.
Surely there’s nothing improper in that—not after all they’ve been through together—but still . . .

Olivia glanced at Curtis, trying to judge his reaction. And in that moment Curtis looked up, not even mildly affronted by Joshua’s advances toward Maureen but miserable just the same.
At me! He looks miserably at me!
Olivia thought her throbbing temples might burst. She felt herself scowl at Maureen.
He might not love me, but he certainly deserves better than those glances Maureen throws Joshua’s way!

Mrs. Melkford left soon after. The sudden awkward silence between the remaining three lay thick.

“I should be going.” Curtis rose. He took Maureen’s hand respectfully. “I’ll send my attorney round tomorrow. He’ll do a preliminary interview with you, and then I’m sure we’ll all be working on the case together. I know this will not be easy, but I thank you from the bottom of my heart. My parents will thank you.”

“You’ve told them?”

“Some. Not everything. It would be too painful for them to know the details. But they know she’s dead and that they mustn’t search anymore. They must let go now. Thanks to what we’ve all done, what we’ve learned, they can.”

He glanced at Olivia but did not step nearer. “Drake as good as murdered Lydia. I hope Dorothy understands that she’s well rid of the man.”

Olivia drew in her breath. “It’s been a shock, of course. But she had some inkling that he was not what he said. I think she realizes he was using her, misusing her. She just didn’t want to believe it. And then to learn that he was already married—still married—when they stood in church for their wedding . . .” Olivia hesitated; she didn’t know if she truly wanted to tell Curtis, but she could not bear the burden alone any longer. “There’s a greater concern. Dorothy’s not well. She was not well before Drake left.”

Curtis paused, frowned. Olivia saw knowledge, understanding, and alarm cross his face. He started to speak, stopped, and started again. “I don’t know how else to say this, but she must see a doctor. Right away.”

Olivia shook her head, tears filling her eyes, threatening to spill forward. She did her best to compose herself. “She’s being treated.”

“Curse the man!” Curtis’s fists clenched. Olivia knew it was only the company of women that kept him from smashing the table with his fist. The muscles of his jaw worked in sharp contrast to the pity that filled his eyes. “I’m so sorry. So very sorry . . . If there is anything I can do—anything at all . . .”

But Olivia shrugged helplessly. “I don’t know what to do,” she whispered as the tears coursed her cheeks. “I don’t know . . .”

“The best doctors . . . ,” he began.

“Are seeing her now,” she finished. “Drake’s given my sister a death sentence.”

Curtis nodded. “As he did mine.”

“Yours?” Olivia felt the blood drain from her face. She glanced, barely comprehending, from Curtis to Maureen and back again. “Lydia . . . was your sister?”

Curtis looked puzzled. “Yes, of course.”

“You loved Lydia—as your sister.” Olivia felt that scales were falling from her eyes.

“With all my heart,” Curtis vowed. “Much as I care for Maureen and Joshua, much as I would give all I have to help Dorothy.”

Olivia caught a light of growing understanding in Maureen’s eyes, her half smile. Her heart too full to speak, Olivia placed her hand in the one Maureen extended.

Olivia glanced at their clasp of hands in wonder as Maureen pressed her fingers. “I’ll be excusin’ myself now. I’m tired, and tomorrow promises a full day.” Smiling, Maureen slipped quietly from the room.

Olivia knew Maureen had spoken, but she could barely take in her words for staring at Curtis.

Yet no sooner had Maureen closed the dining room door to the hallway than Olivia forced herself to her feet and jerked it open. “Wait, please wait.” She pulled the door closed behind her.

Maureen turned. Olivia had not been running, but she couldn’t catch her breath, couldn’t steady her runaway thoughts, her tied tongue.

But Maureen waited, still smiling.

“I asked once if you love him, if you thought you might love him.”

Maureen started, looked taken aback, as if trying to place the memory.

A memory that all but seared my soul!
“Before you and Joshua and Curtis left to work together—the night Curtis’s note came.” Olivia mustered her courage. “You said . . .”

Maureen blinked, the light of understanding rising in her eyes. “Joshua. I thought you meant Joshua.”

Olivia clasped her hand to her heart as if holding it there might keep it from bursting through her chest. “Joshua,” she said, breathless. “You love Joshua.”

Maureen’s head tilted ever so slightly. Her shoulders lifted; her smile began with the turning up of the corners of her mouth and radiated, as if from the inside out, until her eyes shone and she glowed with a beauty Olivia had not seen before. Maureen whispered, her voice growing stronger, more certain, with each word, “Yes. Yes, I love Joshua.” She bit her lip and squared her shoulders. “And he loves me.”

Olivia smiled in return, her tears welling to match Maureen’s own. Both women laughed softly, conspiratorially, like sisters.

Maureen clasped Olivia’s arms, kissed her cheek. “Go to him. He’s waitin’. He’s been waitin’ for you.”

For three weeks Maureen, Joshua, Olivia, and Curtis conferred with the prosecuting attorney.

Though white slavery was a topic of frenzy in the news, Maureen was cautioned by Curtis and warned by the prosecutor that the jury and the courtroom, packed by men, might be largely unsympathetic to her cause, might even be connected by various means to the roots of the tangled web.

They coached her to remain calm under fire, to anticipate heckling and harassment, to imagine she had a bull’s-eye target posted on her chest—but one that could deflect poison arrows.

The coaching took its toll. But day after day, Joshua reassured her of his belief in her by his gentle encouragement and moral support, of his care for her heart by the tender compassion he showed for the weight of her load, and he shared that load by the quiet strength his nearness imparted. Though Maureen could have basked in the warmth of that sun forever, she dared ask him the thing she knew would test his heart.

One late afternoon, after the attorney had gone, while Curtis and Olivia walked in the winter garden, Maureen asked Joshua about Katie Rose.

“She’s still at Dorothy’s—safe and sound as a bell, goin’ to work at the Triangle day by day, guarded by good men she doesn’t even know are there. Nothin’ to worry your mind.”

“I mean her heart. I need to know her heart.”

“Give her time. You know Katie Rose.” Joshua shrugged. “She’s green with envy over the attention you’re gettin’—from Mrs. Melkford, Olivia, from the women of the circle.”

“From you?” Maureen asked softly, knowing her sister, knowing the answer.

“Probably.” He didn’t look at her. “She’ll come round. She’s got to find a life of her own.”

“But what if she doesn’t? She’s in love with you, you know.”

“She’s in love with love. I’m the only man she’s known, the only man she’s been allowed to know. She’ll find her own life in time. Let her grow up.”

“She’ll claim I’ve stolen you from her.”

“And have you?” he asked, smiling, but Maureen saw the urgency of the question in his eyes.

“I don’t want to hurt Katie Rose.”

“Nor do I. But it’s you I love. It’s you I’ve always loved, from the time you were a slip of a girl, from the first day I saw you walk through the fields to Lord Orthbridge’s house and into service.”

Maureen felt the warmth begin in the too-fast beating of her heart and radiate through her torso and arms. She felt the heat rise, with fearful hope, into her face until her eyes smarted and filled. “How could you love me? Did you not know what Lord Orthbridge—?”

But he pressed two fingers to her lips. “Have I not told you? It’s you I’ve loved and never stopped lovin’—just waitin’, hopin’ you’d look my way.”