Rescuing the Heiress (7 page)

A stir near the wide sets of double doors drew his attention. They swung open and hoards of excitedly babbling women began to exit the hall.

Michael stepped up on the base of the monument to labor so he could peer over the heads of other men.

He spotted his mother, Tess and that despicable little banker in moments.

Shouldering his way through the crowd, Michael quickly joined them. If Tess was surprised to see him she gave to indication of it.

“I'll walk you home,” he said.

“That won't be necessary but we do thank you.” Tess smiled slightly. “Don't we, Mary?”

“Aye. We know the way. You can go back to work, son.”

“I got O'Neill to cover for me,” Michael explained. “I don't have to report back till morning.”

Tess's smile spread. “Well, it won't take us
that
long to walk the few blocks home, even if it is mostly uphill.”

Next to her, Phineas cleared his throat. “Ahem. I have a carriage waiting, Miss Clark.” He fidgeted and ran a finger beneath his starched collar as if it was choking him. “I, um, well, I didn't know you'd be with anyone. It only seats two.”

“Then I know there will surely be plenty of room for
you to ride alone,” Tess said, reaching to pat the cook's hand. “I shall walk with my friends.”

It didn't escape Michael's notice that she had said
friends,
not
friend.
Good. The young woman might be capricious but she was definitely loyal. If she had gone off with that weasel of a banker and left his mother to trudge home alone, Michael would not have thought well of her. Not well at all.

To his delight, Phineas appeared to be struck dumb.

“Shove off, man,” Michael told him. “You heard Miss Clark. She has no further need of you.”

“Well, I never…”

“No, you probably haven't ever been talked to this plainly before. 'Tis high time you were.”

In the background, Michael was certain he heard Tess's familiar giggle when the other man turned and stomped off. That laugh warmed his heart. Obviously she wasn't angry with him. What a relief.

Now, his biggest remaining concern was his mother's welfare. When her boss got wind of her nighttime outing with Tess, there was sure to be a blowup. He just hoped and prayed it wasn't going to cost her a job she loved and the rooms she occupied in the servants' wing of the estate.

When he offered his arm to Mary, Michael was astounded to feel Tess fall into step on his opposite side. She was not only grasping his elbow as if they were promenading, she was grinning beneath her thin veil.

He chanced a smile in her direction. “I take it you
weren't disappointed that your beau had no room for the likes of us.”

“Oh, dear. I hadn't thought of it that way but you're probably right. Phineas is terribly snobbish.” She huffed. “And he is certainly
not
my beau.”

“I take it he believes he has your father's blessing to court you.”

“Then Father is sadly mistaken,” Tess replied. “I have no beau, nor do I seek one. The more I hear about women's rights, the more empowered I feel.”

“You have no desire for home and hearth?” Michael asked, feeling his mother squeezing his arm as he spoke.

“I didn't say that, exactly.” Tess gathered her skirts in her free hand to keep them out of her way as they began to ascend the steeply sloping avenue. “I simply see no pressing need to swoon at some gentleman's feet and pretend I am in need of sanctuary.”

“I see.” It was all Michael could do to keep from chuckling at her naïveté. She had grown up so cosseted by her father she saw herself as far more independent than she truly was. If Gerald Clark had not been exercising his control over her, he would not have bothered to send an emissary to the suffrage lecture to do his bidding and to squire Tess home.

Expanding upon that thought was sobering. G.B. had his fingers in plenty of political pies in city and county government, including the upper echelons of the fire and police departments. If he took a notion to sabotage
a promotion within one of those organizations he would probably succeed.

When Mary asked that they rest for a few moments so she could catch her breath, Michael decided to use the opportunity to voice his concerns to Tess in the hope she would understand.

“I want to ask a favor,” he said.

“Really?” Lifting the veil, she placed it atop the hat and looked directly at him. “All right. Ask away.”

“I'd like you to make certain that your father doesn't blame me or my mother for your transgressions.”

“And just what would those be?”

“This evening. And the one before,” Michael said, gesturing at the pavilion that lay behind them at the foot of the hill. “He's a powerful man. If he thought we had led you astray he might not be very forgiving.”

“Nonsense,” Tess said flatly. “Annie said the same thing. You're all wrong. Father isn't vindictive. He may be stern but he's fair.”

Although Michael nodded and dropped the subject he didn't stop wondering if Tess was fooling herself. G. B. Clark's reputation painted him as anything but evenhanded.

If he failed to be fair-minded, or if he refused to believe his daughter's claim that these nightly jaunts had been her idea, there was no telling how far the ripples of discontent would extend. Or who they would harm.

T
ess would have loved to attend every lecture Maud Younger gave in the City by the Bay. What she didn't want to do was push her father too far, too fast. A week after her last trip to the pavilion she was still waiting for him to mention Phineas and chastise her for her behavior.

So far Papa hadn't said another word about the incident, not even when their pastor's Sunday sermon had dealt with forgiveness. Waiting for her father to finally get around to mentioning her transgressions was harder for Tess than being immediately scolded would have been.

As a result she had been unduly nervous when she entered the dining room each ensuing morning for breakfast.

Today, her father was dressed in a neatly tailored gray, pin-striped suit and vest that almost matched the color of his moustache. He sat at the far end of the massive,
linen-covered table, his visage hidden behind a fresh copy of the
Chronicle.

Tess skirted the table to pour herself a cup of hot coffee from the silver service on the buffet rather than wait to be served. As she took her place at the opposite end of the long table she peeked around the floral arrangement and said, “Good morning, Father.”

Gerald Clark merely grunted. That kind of reaction was far worse, in her estimation, than his angry words would have been. He had never been one to chat unless the subject of a conversation was finance or something else of equal interest to him, but his recent actions, particularly toward her, had seemed more off-putting than usual.

Looking for a way to draw him out and bring things to a head, Tess asked, “So, how is Phineas Edgerton doing these days? You haven't mentioned him much lately.”

With that, the newspaper was partially lowered. Gerald peered over the top edge, his bushy gray brows knit. “If you must know, he is nursing a broken heart.”

“Why?” Tess felt herself beginning to frown, too, and carefully schooled her features to eliminate any sign of negativity. “Surely he can't still be upset that I declined his offer to drive me home.”

“He can and he is,” her father replied. “That was cruel of you, Tess.”

Astounded, she stared. “Cruel? Phineas intimated that I was welcome to ride with him but my companions were not.
That
was the cruel thing.”

“What? You expected him to give way to servants?
It's bad enough that you persist in treating Annie Dugan as an equal. The girl is your maid, Tess, not your friend, and it's time someone reminded you of your place as well as hers.”

“Annie is a truer friend than any of the other young women I know.”

“You see? That's what I've been trying to say. Your mind has been poisoned by that drivel you've been hearing at those idiotic lectures.”

“I respectfully disagree.”

Rising, her father crumpled the paper and his napkin next to his plate and faced her, his moustache twitching as his jaw clenched repeatedly. “There is nothing respectful about the way you speak to me, girl. I suggest you remember who supports you, who buys you those expensive gowns and pretty trinkets you love so much.”

Tess fingered the dainty pearl earbobs that were her favorites. Other than those, the only jewelry she wore regularly was the cameo pinned at the high, ruffled neck of her blouse. That brooch had been her mother's.

“I do appreciate your generosity, Father,” she said, struggling to sound normal in spite of wanting to shout, or weep, or both. “It was Mother who loved jewelry and furs. I ask for very little beyond my daily needs.”

“Bah!” Muttering under his breath, Gerald Clark stalked from the room, leaving Tess to wonder if she should wait there for his possible return or if she dared head for the kitchen where she knew she'd find sanctuary with Mary.

She fidgeted, counted slowly to one hundred, then made up her mind. In a few quick steps she'd made good her escape.

 

“There may be extra duty to be had tonight,” Michael told O'Neill. “We'll both need to be alert.”

“Why? You plannin' to start some trouble I don't know about, boyo?”

“No. It's because of the crowds expected at the Grand Opera House. Caruso's singing.”

“I'd lots rather hear a good
Irish
tenor,” O'Neill said, grinning. “Those Italians are too full o' themselves to suit me.”

That comment made Michael laugh. There were many immigrant populations in San Francisco and each thought it was the most important. He supposed that was normal, yet he wished they could all work together better for the common good. If the various factions weren't at odds with outsiders, they were busy squabbling amongst themselves. As far as he was concerned, it was wasted effort.

Stepping out onto Howard Street in front of Station #4, he looked at the Chinese laundry across the street, then turned and raised his gaze to encompass the expensive homes on Nob Hill to the north. It would be at least three more days before his usual visit to his mother and he'd had to miss last Sunday's services because of a small fire at Meigg's Wharf, so he hadn't seen Tess in over a week. Not even from a distance.

Would she be one of the opera patrons at the special
performance tonight? he wondered. Perhaps. And if so, whose arm would she be on? If it happened to be that young banker's, as he suspected it might, Michael was not going to be pleased.

He snorted in self-derision. Who was he kidding? The only person he wanted to visualize standing beside Tess Clark was himself. He could easily imagine her lovely blue eyes twinkling at him; her lips curving gently in a smile that warmed him through and through no matter how cold the wind off the Pacific happened to be.

That dream was never going to come true, he concluded, so why waste time envisioning it?

Deep in thought, he circled the narrow, three-story fire station building and entered the ground-floor stables from the rear.

The behavior of the usually placid fire horses drew him back to reality. They seemed unduly agitated. Since there had been no recent alarm, there was no reason for them to be behaving as if they were about to be harnessed to one of the steam pumpers and race off to a fire.

Approaching the nearest gray gelding, Michael stroked its neck to calm it as he pictured Tess ministering to her mare the night he had driven her into the city. Her touch had been gentle but firm. She had the ways of a true horse lover and he admired that about her.

“As well as plenty of other things,” Michael muttered, continuing to soothe the nervous animals as best he could. Several of them were prancing around in their
stalls as if they were about to try to kick their way out. That was odd.

He raked his fingers through his thick, dark hair as he pondered the animals' unrest. They sometimes behaved this way after a slight earthquake and he assumed he had simply not been as aware of the shaking as the horses were. If so, they'd soon settle down. They always did.

Going about his chores, he fed and watered the teams, then sauntered back into the front portion of the station where the captain's scarred oak desk, a telephone and the red-enameled alarm box sat. Duty rosters were pinned to the walls next to a calendar from one of the banks G. B. Clark didn't happen to own. A pair of narrow windows flanked the front door. Because this room was so close to the stable and a live boiler also sat in the basement, it smelled more like a steamy barn than an office.

It wasn't much to covet. Nevertheless, it was Michael's goal to lay claim to it soon. Aspiring to the next rank made a suitable goal for the present. And maybe someday he'd be the kind of chief engineer who inspired his men to loyalty and valor the way Dennis Sullivan did.

The Sullivan family had their own private quarters over on Bush Street, Michael reminded himself. Quarters suitable for his mother and perhaps a family of his own, as well.

His only problem seemed to be an inability to picture any woman other than Tess Clark in the role of his wife.

 

“I wish I could take you with me to hear Caruso tonight,” Tess told Annie. “But since I can't, I want you
to go visit your mother again. You might as well stay over till morning.”

“You'll need me to help you undress when you get home,” Annie argued, shaking her head. “That gown is mighty tight.”

“I can manage. If I get stuck I'll call Mary. Once I loosen this horrid corset I'll be fine.” She tried to take a deep breath and failed. “If I don't swoon first.”

“You look beautiful in that shade of green,” Annie said. “The velvet shimmers when you move.”

“I know. I love it.” Tess patted her highly upswept hair and pivoted in front of the mirror so she could see the emerald and exotic-feather-decorated clip her maid had added at one side. “I just wish…”

Annie giggled. “I know. You wish you could show Michael Mahoney.”

“I wish nothing of the kind!”

“Oh, then why are you blushing?”

Tess made a silly face and turned away. “I'm not. This outfit is simply constricting my breathing and I am a bit faint.”

“Balderdash. You always blush terribly when anyone mentions that man. Admit it. You're fond of him.”

“All right. I may care for him a bit. That doesn't mean I intend to get serious.”

“Have it your way. You talk a good fight but you retreat the minute the tide turns against you.”

“This tide has always run against me,” Tess said sadly. “I am who I am. Nothing can ever change that.”

“Maud Younger disagrees.”

“Yes, but she has determined to remain single and dedicate herself to the cause of freedom and equality for all. I agree with her in principle. I just don't feel that strong a personal calling.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning, it would please me to someday marry and have a family,” Tess said, staring out the window of her room without really seeing the city below.

Annie gasped, muting the reaction by pressing her fingertips to her lips. “You aren't considering that horrid Phineas person, are you?”

“No. Of course not. But until my father finds someone else, I've decided to make the best of it. Phineas will be meeting Father and me at the opera tonight.” She made a face. “I've perfumed a lace hanky so I can breathe its lavender sweetness if I'm too overcome by his presence.”

“I don't think a bucket of cologne would be enough to help me tolerate that man,” Annie said. “You are much stronger than I am.”

Tess shook her head gently, taking care to keep from dislodging her elegantly coiffed hair. “Not really. I pray all the time that the good Lord will spare me from having to marry such an odious man. There must be someone waiting for me, someone who will please God, my father
and
me.”

“That's a tall order,” the maid said, “but I will pray for it, too.”

“Good.” Tess reached for her white fur cape and the small, beaded bag containing her opera glasses. “And
while you are praying, please ask that I will remain in control of my temper tonight. If Phineas tries to take liberties, I fear I might want to give him the same as he gave poor Michael the last time they met.”

Annie gasped. “You wouldn't!”

“No, of course not.” She smiled wryly. “But that doesn't mean I would not be sorely tempted.”

 

It wasn't within Michael's jurisdiction to stand across from the opera house and watch the carriages and motorcars of the elite arrive to discharge their wealthy passengers. Instead, he had to be satisfied to position himself at the corner of Howard and Seventh streets so he could see all the way up to Mission.

He knew that unless the Clarks' driver was forced to circle the block there was little chance of catching even a glimpse of Tess. Nevertheless, he felt compelled to try.

Tess would be beautiful, of course. That was a given. And even if he failed to actually see her he could always imagine her loveliness the way he did nearly every waking moment, not to mention in his fondest dreams.

Michael no longer had any doubt he was smitten. Although he and Tess had been acquainted for years and had played like siblings when they were younger, he had only recently realized what an admirable woman she had become. It was undoubtedly just as well that he had moved into the fire station to live four years ago, before Tess had matured enough to catch his eye. If he had still lived under the Clark roof there was no telling how hard he would have had to struggle to keep his
distance, especially if she had shown the least interest in him.

Was she interested now? He couldn't help but wonder. After she had asked him to be her escort to the lecture it seemed as if something important had changed between them. Was he imagining that she now looked at him fondly? Was he fooling himself that there was tenderness in those expressive, blue eyes when they met his? Surely not.

Michael shrugged. What difference did it make? He was a working man and she was an heiress. There was no chance, none at all, that he could ever hope to climb the ladder of success enough to be considered her peer, let alone earn enough to support her in the manner to which she was accustomed. And he would never accept money from her. Not under any circumstances. He had his pride.

Watching the slowly moving parade of elegant carriages and a smattering of automobiles turn onto Mission Street, he scanned them carefully, looking for the fancy cabriolet he had driven when he had been with Tess and Annie. When he finally spotted it, pulled by a brace of matched bays this time, he thought his heart might pound out of his chest.

The Clarks' driver was easing the sleekly polished rig between two smaller buggies when a motorcar passed in a sputtering, smoky roar, frightening several teams besides his and causing them to fight the harness traces.

Michael ran forward, leaped the tracks to dodge a
clanging electric streetcar, and raced to Tess's rescue without a thought for his own safety.

He grabbed the horses' bridles and held on to the team for dear life, fighting against their desire to break free and run amok with the Clark carriage and its passengers.