When Love Calls (10 page)

 12 

“Num-bah, puh-leez.” Hannah stood in front of the mirror watching her lips as she formed the words so often repeated when working as an operator.

“I don’t know what you’re worried about.” Rosie laid her hands on the open volume in front of her. “You seem like you’ve been connecting calls all your life.”

Hannah smiled. Their first week at the practice switchboard had been fun. Some of the girls had become quite frazzled at trying to remember all the details, but Hannah found it much easier to pick up than she’d expected. Still, Saturday offered her the perfect opportunity to practice.

“Mrs. Reuff said I needed to work on my enunciation.” She faced the mirror again. “What do you think? Are the vowels open enough when I say
puh-leez
?”

Tessa turned from her seat on the sofa. “Would you two
puh-leez
be quiet? I’m working.”

“Collecting more headlines?” Hannah joined her on the sofa.

“Tessa, I’d like to hear them—puh-leez.” Rosie giggled.

Hannah moaned. “Don’t encourage her.”

“I thought you Gregory girls were all about encouraging each other’s dreams.” Rosie closed her book. “Read me one, Tessa.”

“Your mother gave me some older newspapers. This article is
from a paper that came out the day we moved here. ‘Groom waits while bride suicides.’”

“Tess, that’s horrible!”

Hannah’s youngest sister bit her lip but didn’t look remotely contrite. “But I bet everyone who saw that headline read the article. Wouldn’t you?”

Rosie raised her brows, laughter dancing in her eyes.

“That’s not the point.” Hannah removed her hat pin and hat and set them on the table. “Was there any news we
needed
to know in that paper?”

“There was another fire.”

“Really? Where?”

“Hmm.” Tessa paused to read the article. “It was at one of the Western Union supply buildings. They think it was arson. Some kind of explosion. It says they have several suspects.”

Fear spiraled up Hannah’s spine. Another fire linked to Western Union. She prayed Walt had not been involved.

Lincoln stepped up to the fairway and turned to his caddie. The young man handed Lincoln a wood from the canvas and leather golf bag. Lincoln thanked him and stepped around Pete Williams to tee off. After positioning himself on the side of the golf ball, he drew in a deep breath of spring air and said a prayer of thanks. Only the second day of May, and he was already enjoying the golf course at the country club.

Muscles tense, Lincoln twisted his body and swung the club. The ball sailed into the air until it became a white dot against the pale blue sky. It came down just short of the putting green.

“Not bad, Linc. Good loft.” Pete clapped him on the shoulder and chuckled. “Now, let me show you how it’s really done.”

Lincoln laughed and stepped aside. Pete bent over the ball, his rounded belly hanging low. He swung the golf club, and the shot went wide.

“So that’s how it’s done? Funny, I thought the goal was to get the ball in the hole.”

“Yeah, yeah. Always a smart guy.” Pete fell in step beside Lincoln as they walked down the fairway. Their caddies fell in behind. “I heard the Gregory girl came in the office the other day and put you in your place.”

“Who said that?”

“Cedric. Who else?” Pete walked to his ball and lined up the shot. He chipped it onto the putting green.

Lincoln removed an iron from his golf bag and approached his ball. “Cedric should have been a fiction writer. He always has his own version of things.” He drew the club back and watched the ball bounce onto the green, then roll closer to the hole.

“So what’s your version? Did she put you in your place, or vice versa?”

“I plead the fifth.” With a grin, Lincoln turned to the caddie and exchanged his iron for a putter.

“Well, well, well. I guess you don’t need to say anything. That smile on your face is as self-incriminating as it can get. Do we need to have you and Miss Gregory over for dinner one evening?”

“No.” Lincoln shook his head and practiced a couple of putting shots. “Hannah Gregory might be a fascinating young woman, but she isn’t interested in the man who took her home.” He tapped the ball. It rolled two yards and circled the hole without going in. Emitting a groan, he tapped it. The ball dropped with a ping into the cup.

“It’s not like you to let one by.” Pete easily sank his putt, then shot Lincoln a challenging grin.

Lincoln handed his caddie the club. “Are you talking about my putt or Miss Gregory?”

“Both.” He wrapped his arm around Lincoln’s shoulder. “Now, let’s go get something to eat, and thanks to my last stellar putt, I believe you’re buying. But we need to hurry. Ever since that fire, Elise has been on edge.”

They started back to the clubhouse, and Lincoln considered
how to ask about Elise’s mental health. She’d always been prone to periods of melancholy. “Is everything okay with Elise?”

Pete nodded. “She’s a little rattled, is all. She’s better since they made an arrest.”

“An arrest?”

“A disgruntled telegraph employee.” Pete tugged on the points of his vest. “And since Albert came home, I must say Elise’s spirits are better. One thing I know is that I’ll never send him away again. It’s too hard on her. She’s too fragile.”

Rounding a bend in the path, Lincoln picked up the pace. He grieved for Pete as he struggled to find answers to his wife’s and his son’s disturbances and melancholy.

“And how is Albert doing?” Like Pete, he’d hoped Albert’s stay at the special home in Germany would help him overcome any of the tendencies he’d inherited from his mother.

“The doctors there declared him cured.” Pete huffed and puffed up the last incline. “A complete success, they say.” They reached the clubhouse, and Pete paused at the door. “He seems like his old self. He’s talking of returning to college next year.”

“I hope he does. He’s a brilliant young man.”

Pete’s eyes lit up at the compliment. “And he needs to do something with his life so he can take care of me when I’m old.”

“
When
you’re old?” Lincoln clapped him on the shoulder. “You’ll always have me, old man.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

“Hey!” Lincoln opened the door to the clubhouse. “For that, you’re buying your own steak.”

“I’ll buy if you promise to join Elise and me for Sunday dinner. You can see Albert for yourself and get reacquainted.”

“I’m not his favorite person, Pete. You know that.”

“I’m telling you, he’s changed. Come see for yourself.”

Lincoln smiled and agreed. He’d do anything Pete asked, including sitting through an uncomfortable dinner. He owed too much to the man, who’d been like a father to him, to ever say no to anything he asked.

The last notes from the closing hymn lingered in the air. Trying to remain inconspicuous, Hannah turned around and scanned the back of the church where the latecomers usually sat. No Lincoln. Disappointment rippled through her. But that was ridiculous. Why would she care if Lincoln Cole visited her congregation again?

Charlotte touched Hannah’s arm. “Where’s your friend Walt?”

“Isn’t he here?” Hannah’s gaze swept the room, and guilt nudged her. She’d noticed Lincoln was absent but not Walt, her oldest friend?

Walt’s mother and father, clearly upset, huddled in the corner, speaking to the preacher. How odd. Was Walt ill?

“Can we go? I’m hungry.” Tessa’s stomach growled as if on cue.

Hannah waved her aside. “Not yet. I want to check on Walt.”

She smoothed the bodice of her yellow calico dress and made her way through the congregants. She waited at the side for Mr. and Mrs. Calloway to finish their conversation. But when Mrs. Calloway saw her, she motioned her over.

Feeling like an intruder, Hannah reluctantly joined them.

Mrs. Calloway latched on to her arm as soon as she was within reach. “Oh, Hannah, Walt desperately needs your help.”

“Why? What’s wrong?”

Mrs. Calloway leaned close and whispered, “He’s been arrested.”

Hannah gasped. “What happened?”

A deep frown dug crevices in Mr. Calloway’s face. “He got himself into this, Grace. He can get himself out. All this union nonsense. He should have joined me on the farm like we always wanted.”

“It wasn’t his way, Ethan.” Tears welled in Mrs. Calloway’s eyes. “And you know he needs a lawyer.”

Mr. Calloway pulled his wife close. “I’m sorry, Grace, but we can’t afford a fancy lawyer, even if we wanted to. We’re not set to do that, and we’ve got the other children to tend to.”

“I know. That’s why we need Hannah. She’s been to law school. Who would fight for him more than Hannah?”

Hannah pressed her hand against her throat. “You want me to represent him?”

“Please, Hannah.”

“But I’m not a lawyer. I didn’t even finish law school.” Hannah’s chest constricted when a tear slipped from Mrs. Calloway’s eyes. “What’s he been charged with?”

“Arson.” The woman paused to wipe away her tear. “They think he might have something to do with a supply shed fire, but they arrested him for burning down a carriage house over all this union nonsense.”

A glimmer of hope flickered inside Hannah. Walt couldn’t have been involved in either fire. He’d been helping her and her sisters move when the first fire occurred, and he’d been with her the afternoon of the second. When she’d arrived home from operators’ school, he’d been waiting on her porch. All she’d have to do is explain that to the authorities.

Oh no.

As if someone had blown out her candle, the flame of hope extinguished and a crater formed in her stomach. If she told anyone Walt had been with her, she’d lose her position with the telephone company. She and her sisters would be penniless.

“You’ll help us, won’t you?” Mrs. Calloway squeezed her arm.

She glanced toward her sisters, and Tessa gave her an impatient glare. She was all her sisters had. But how could she let Walt suffer in jail when she knew he was innocent?
Please, Lord, help me think of a way out of this for both Walt and me.

No answer came, but she didn’t truly expect one. She turned to the one thing she could always count on—her own ability to think things through. Could Walt have had time to start the second fire and then come see her? It was doubtful, but she’d seen his passion about those men being blacklisted by Western Union. But sweet Walt starting a fire? Did the police have evidence to convict him? Or were they counting on the court’s often poor attitude toward unions?