Echoes of Mercy: A Novel (39 page)

“But not without your signature.” Oliver stared at his father, hardly able to believe they were having this conversation.

Father fell into another long, thoughtful silence, during which Oliver wanted to crawl out of his skin. If he was released, he wouldn’t be able to assist Carrie in her investigation, and he wouldn’t be able to gather his own ideas for improvements once he took over. If he was let go, he’d have to slink home with his tail between his legs. And he wouldn’t see Carrie again.

He couldn’t stay silent another second. “Father, you aren’t going to sign my discharge papers, are you?”

Slowly his father shifted his gaze until it met Oliver’s. “Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t.”

“I can give you several!” But then Oliver couldn’t form a coherent sentence. The thought of never seeing Carrie again rendered him unable to think, let alone speak.

Father nodded, his expression knowing. “You’ve fallen for the girl.”

Oliver sat, silent, unmoving. He couldn’t—he
wouldn’t
—deny it. Carrie’s selflessness, her compassion, and her simple beauty had spun a web around him. He was caught, and he had no desire to free himself. But Father would never approve a relationship with her. Father and Mother had plans for him—plans that didn’t include a woman whose parents had sold her into servitude. As pointless as it was to have fallen in love with her, he still wouldn’t deny his feelings. He owed Carrie at least that much.

“Yes. Yes, Father, I have grown to care deeply for Carrie Lang.”

“That’s reason enough to take you out of Sinclair and back to Wichita, where you belong.”

Oliver gathered his courage. “And if I choose not to go?” His words were said with the same respect he’d always shown his father. But even so, Father’s frown grew fierce.

“You would defy me?”

He’d never gone against his father’s instructions. Not even as a rowdy
youth. To consider doing so now left him trembling inside. He wished he’d donned his shirt and trousers before having this talk. A man shouldn’t confront his father for the first time while dressed in a red-and-white-striped nightshirt. He sat up straight, hoping a formal bearing would detract from his very informal attire. “I don’t want to defy you, Father. But I came to Sinclair to complete a task. To ready myself for leadership in the factory. If I leave now, before I’ve finished what I set out to do, how can I have any respect for myself?”

He stood and crossed the short distance between the sofa and the chair. The carpet felt scratchy against his soles, and he fought the desire to fidget. He looked into his father’s mustached, lined face, and a feeling of love swept over him. If Father insisted, he’d return to Wichita. He couldn’t break his father’s heart by defying him. But how he hoped his father loved him enough to trust him.

“I’ll not do anything to bring disgrace on the Dinsmore name. I know who I am.” And he knew what his station required. He swallowed the lump of regret that threatened to choke him and continued. “Allow me to complete my purpose here. And allow me to assist Carrie in determining the truth about Bratcher’s death. The truth will only benefit us—all of us.” His voice dropped to a raspy whisper. “Allow me to stay.”

Caroline’s alarm clock jangled. She rolled over and slapped at it, then blinked, surprised. Had she actually slept? For hours she’d tossed and turned in her bed, fighting the desire to go search for Letta, Lank, and Lesley. Only Noble’s firm, yet kind, instruction to leave the search to the authorities and take care of herself—
“What good will you be to the children if you exhaust yourself to the point of illness?”
—kept her from surrendering to temptation. Yet she’d been certain she’d never relax enough to fall asleep. To have slept soundly gave evidence of how badly she’d needed the rest.

She rolled out of bed, her stiff joints protesting, and visited the bathroom at the end of the hallway. In the midafternoon she never had to wait since the
other boarding hotel residents were still at their jobs. Then she dressed and combed her hair into a simple twist. She didn’t need to be at the factory for several hours, which would allow time for her to walk around the city in the hope of catching sight of one of the Holcomb children.

Father, please let them be found!
The prayer, offered so many times over the past two days, formed without effort and winged from her heart to the heavens.

She clattered down all three sets of stairs to the ground level and stepped, breathless, onto the sidewalk. A light drizzle fell—barely a mist—shrouding the city in a cloak of gray. Such a gloomy color. She preferred sunshine yellow. Especially when applied to the flecks in Ollie’s eyes. She gave a little start. She needed to think about the Holcomb children,
not
Ollie. Determinedly setting her feet in motion, she began moving toward the center of town.

Policemen regularly checked the Holcomb house, hoping to find that the children had returned home. But thus far they’d not witnessed anyone either coming or going. The children would be hungry, and Lank had successfully pilfered food in the past, so Caroline intended to visit each of the general stores selling food items and ask if a red-headed boy, or a pair of them, had been seen in the store.

The first two stores were crowded with Saturday shoppers, and the frazzled clerks couldn’t recall a red-headed boy coming in but wouldn’t swear there hadn’t been one. Caroline moved on to the third mercantile, a smaller store with fewer people filling the aisles. The woman proprietor took several minutes to talk with Caroline, asking and answering questions, but it soon became clear that neither Lank nor Lesley had been in the store.

Frustrated, Caroline stepped back outside to discover the gentle mist had turned into a light rain. With a sigh she pulled her shawl over her head and moved to the edge of the boardwalk, preparing to cross to the opposite side of the street. A fancy carriage approached from the left, and she paused, impatiently waiting for its beautiful pair of steel-gray horses to pass by so she could continue her errand.

From within the carriage’s covered section, a deep voice suddenly commanded, “Driver, stop!”

The driver pulled back on the reins, and the carriage came to a halt directly in Caroline’s pathway. Shaking her head in vexation, she started to pass behind it, but the voice came again, freezing her in place.

“Miss Lang?”

She edged to the carriage and looked over the side of the protective box. Mr. Fulton Dinsmore was perched on the leather seat. A silk top hat covered his hair, and a gleaming black cane stretched from his gloved hands to the toes of his polished boots. He looked every bit the aristocrat, and immediately she felt dowdy in her simple frock and woven shawl draped over her head like a little old woman.

She flipped back the shawl, settling it around her shoulders, and formed a polite reply. “Good afternoon, Mr. Dinsmore. How nice to see you again.” The first time she’d seen the man, something about him had seemed familiar, and now she understood why. His silver goatee and curled mustache had detracted from his eyes, but now she saw from whom Ollie had inherited his unique eye color. Gazing at Mr. Dinsmore’s face, she received a glimpse of how Ollie might look in another thirty years. Handsome. Distinguished. Unapproachable. The realization set her back a few inches.

Mr. Dinsmore leaned forward and peeked from beneath the fringed canopy. “The rain is increasingly strong. You’ll soon be soaked with no umbrella to block the moisture. Climb inside here. My driver will deliver you wherever you need to go.”

Caroline only needed to cross the street and travel the length of a block to reach the next store. She started to say so, but then she realized what a rare opportunity she was being offered. Would she ever again have a few minutes of uninterrupted time with the man whose employment log held a greater percentage of young workers than any other factory in Kansas? With a smile of appreciation, she said, “Thank you, sir. That’s very kind.”

He held out his hand, she took hold, and he hoisted her aboard. She settled onto the seat, smoothing her damp skirts as best she could. He gave her an imperious glance and said, “To where should I direct the driver?”

To lengthen her time with the man, she said, “The Troubadour Hotel on Third Street, please.”

His eyebrows rose momentarily. He tapped the driver and repeated her directions. The driver flicked the reins, and the carriage rolled forward. Mr. Dinsmore shifted into the corner of the seat and pinned her with an interested look. “Are you staying at the Troubadour?”

Caroline stifled a laugh. He would be appalled if he saw her temporary dwelling. “No, sir. Some friends are staying there, and I plan to dine with them this evening.” Thanks to Noble and Annamarie’s teaching, she could communicate with grace. She sent up a silent prayer of gratitude for all they’d done for her as she waited for Mr. Dinsmore to reply.

“I see.” He tweaked one tip of his mustache with his kidskin-covered fingers. “On my last visit you expressed concern for some children whose father was ill. Mr. Hightower informed me the children are no longer spending their nights in the infirmary. May I presume their father has recovered and therefore you’ve been relieved of the burden of their care?”

Caroline’s heart twisted. She hardly viewed caring for the Holcomb children a burden. “I’m sad to report their father passed away.” She started to tell him the children were missing, but something held her tongue.

“Unfortunate …” Mr. Dinsmore pursed his lips briefly—a slight show of sympathy. “Have they been placed in an orphanage?”

“Not yet.”

“Well, if they need a means of providing for themselves, I’m sure Hightower can create openings for them at the factory. I’ll alert him to—”

Caroline’s chest grew tight. “That won’t be necessary, sir.” She added, belatedly, “But thank you.”

He gazed at her for several seconds. Then he cleared his throat. “How are you getting along at the factory? If I understand correctly, you’d not engaged in factory work prior to your arrival in Sinclair. Are you finding the work satisfactory?”

She wondered if he truly cared or if he was merely making small talk. But she decided to answer honestly. “I’m able to complete my tasks, as assigned, and the compensation is adequate.”

His lips twitched, and his eyes began to twinkle. She’d seen Ollie’s eyes spark in just that way, and she fought a smile, anticipating a teasing comment.

“Quite diplomatic, my dear, but I sense an undercurrent of disquietude.”

The man was astute.

“What about your employment fails to meet your expectation?”

He’d opened the door. She would walk through it. Pulling in a breath of fortification, she met his intense gaze and spoke honestly. “I’m disquieted by the number of children I see working the factory floor. Children, in my opinion, should spend their daytime hours beneath a schoolhouse roof and their nighttime hours sleeping.”

Mr. Dinsmore had the audacity to chuckle. “You are opinionated.”

Caroline didn’t smile. “I have reasons for my opinion, sir.”

“And I have reasons for hiring children.”

Although she didn’t mean to, she snorted—a short, derisive grunt. “Yes. It’s to your financial advantage.” Aware she was treading on dangerous ground—the man could terminate her employment and thereby end her investigation with one word—she couldn’t seem to hold back once she’d started. The captive audience proved too convenient. “With children drawing a quarter of the wages of a man, anyone can see how crowding your employment log with youngsters results in greater profits for the factory. But at what cost, Mr. Dinsmore? I’ll tell you—the cost of these young people’s childhoods. And a childhood is not something that can ever be regained.”

He gazed at her, his expression as bland as a sated cat holding the tail of a mouse for the sake of frightening it. “You’re mistaken, Miss Lang. In my factory every worker is treated equally in regard to compensation. Men, women, children … Their wage is dependent upon the job performed and their years of service.”

Caroline stared in disbelief. Such bald lies he’d delivered with a straight face and glib tongue. Did he think she possessed no sense? “My co-craters, all men, find double the pay of my earnings at the end of the week. The children receive only half of what I draw.” She pursed her lips disdainfully. “Unless you count the bag of imperfect candies sent with them each Saturday as a bonus.”

His eyebrows descended. His fingers tightened on the head of the cane, seeming to strangle the poor horse. “You speak untruths, Miss Lang.” His voice turned hard, his gentility slipping. “Dinsmore’s has welcomed workers of all
ages and genders, treating them equally in every fashion, including compensation. Many of my adult employees began as children, learned to perform a task with precision, and advanced to more skilled—and therefore higher-paying—positions over time. My factory has been a school in and of itself, meeting the needs of countless young people and their families over the years.” His green-gold eyes narrowed into slits. “I advise you to silence your offensive surmising lest you meet with unpleasant consequences.”