My Heart Belongs in Galveston, Texas Page 6

  “Not today,” Mr. Ratto told her. “Perhaps next time. Now go.” He reached past her to hand Jonah his wrapped tea cake. “Before I call the law on the both of you.”

  The twinkle in his eyes gave away the confectioner’s true feelings. However, he was insistent they leave, even to walking to the front door and opening it. “Hurry away, you two, before I change my mind and charge you both double.”

  “Thank you,” she said. “But I promise I will be back.”

  “Not today, you won’t. Young lovers plague me,” he muttered as Madeline walked past.

  “But we are not—”

  “Go,” Jonah told her as he pressed his palm to her back and urged her out onto the sidewalk. “It’s useless to argue with Mr. Ratto. I’ve been losing arguments to him for longer than I care to admit.”

  “Well then,” she said as she tucked the wrapped package into her bag. “It has been interesting, Jonah.”

  Once again, she straightened her backbone and walked away from Jonah Cahill. As before, she could feel him watching as she walked away.

  So great was her distraction that Madeline walked right past the post office and was a full block down the street before she realized her error and turned around. By then, Jonah was gone.

  She briefly considered going back into the confectioner’s shop and attempting to pay Mr. Ratto. Instead, she decided to heed Jonah’s advice and give up.

  Giving up on learning what the Pinkerton detective was doing in Galveston, however, was something she would not consider.

  Jonah sat in the parlor of Mrs. Smith’s rented home on Broadway Avenue and waited for her to join him. Like her New Orleans parlor, this room was also filled with vases of pink roses. Unlike the other parlor, the roses did not extend to the wallpaper or furniture cushions.

  From where he sat, Jonah could see the Browns’ home just down the block. Former president Ulysses Grant would grace the family with a visit next week, but today the grounds were quiet and the gardeners were busy pruning and prettying up the place.

  With his maternal grandfather’s home just a few blocks away, Jonah had spent many happy hours playing like savages with the Brown boys. While they were given the run of the expansive grounds to whoop and holler and do as they wished, the sacred space of Mrs. Brown’s rose garden was forbidden territoy.

  “Good morning, Detective Cahill.”

  Jonah rose to greet Mrs. Smith. Rather than looking tired from her journey, his elderly client appeared fresh as the roses surrounding her. “Good morning, Mrs. Smith,” he said as he helped settle her on her chair and then offered her a rose-covered quilt for her lap.

  “Don’t fuss over me, Detective Cahill,” she told him even as her smile clearly told him she enjoyed his attention. “Please sit and tell me what you’ve learned.”

  What he had learned was this sweet elderly lady had paid dearly to send him on a fruitless search for a person who might not exist. However, he would not give up so soon.

  “The trail for this woman, if indeed she existed, is very cold.”

  “She did exist, and I agree, it is,” she said, her bright eyes assessing him. “That is why I specified the agency send you. I followed the McRee case closely.”

  His gut lurched at the mention of the court case that not only nearly lost him his job, but also lost him the woman he thought he would marry. “I was almost thrown in jail,” he reminded her.

  Thanks to a nosy reporter who ferreted out secrets that the judge thought had come from him. The same nosy reporter who’d decided to plague him again.

  “Yes, but you got the job done, and that is what counts.” She paused to pick at a thread on the quilt and then swung her gaze up to meet his. “Do you not agree?”

  A year ago, he might have said yes. Now he was not so sure.

  “You look ambivalent, Detective Cahill,” she said. “Do you not still believe any means to an end is appropriate?”

  “I believe that every decision has consequences.”

  “Well done,” she said. “You and I shall agree on that point. Now as to the matter at hand. You’ve had time to read and analyze the file.”

  “I have.” He shifted positions. “I have not yet gone to Indianola to investigate that lead, but I plan to do that in the coming week.” At her nod, he continued. “You offer a birth date for your son Samuel Smith, which I was able to confirm. Samuel allegedly married—”

  “Not allegedly,” she corrected. “I was there. It was quite legitimate, that wedding.”

  “Yes, all right,” he said, deciding not to argue the point. “Samuel’s wife Eliza, I find no concrete evidence she ever existed. No birth records, marriage record, or death records.”

  “I’m sure you’ll be tired of hearing me say this, but she lived, I promise. Perhaps you would like a look at our family Bible?”

  “Very much so,” he said.

  Mrs. Smith nodded. “I will send you word when my maid has unpacked it from my trunks.”

  “Thank you.” Jonah leaned forward. “Now I’m afraid this is where the story gets complicated. You say Eliza Smith’s daughter, named Trésor, was born in Galveston on the 18th or 19th of September in 1855, but I can find no record of a female Smith child born on either day. I looked for several weeks in either direction and found nothing to correspond to our missing person.”

  “I sense that is not all you have to tell me,” Mrs. Smith said.

  “No, it’s not. I spoke to an old-timer in the city records department who recalls a hurricane coming through about that time. He says it is possible that is why there are no records of the birth.”

  “Yes, that could well be true. But there is more, I can tell.”

  Jonah frowned. He hated to give this nice old lady bad news, but a hurricane followed by a yellow fever epidemic, as the gentleman explained had happened, certainly lowered the odds that a child would survive.

  “There were fevers after,” he said gently. “Many died.”

  “And you think my granddaughter may have been among them.” She gave him a sideways look. “Does that mean you are giving up the case already?”

  “Not at all.” He considered his next statement and decided to speak plainly. “Mrs. Smith, I will see this case to its end, but as of now, I cannot find any evidence that your granddaughter existed.”

  To his surprise, the elderly woman laughed. “Oh my,” she said. “You are so very forthright. I do believe we will get along just fine.”

  “You understand it is possible there is no granddaughter to find.”

  Her expression sobered. “Yes, of course I understand. But Trésor Smith does exist, and you are the one meant to find her. I know it.”

  Jonah leaned back and studied her a moment. “All right, then tell me how I can find her.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t understand.”

  “If you’re certain she exists, tell me what makes you so certain. Were you present at her birth? Did you receive a letter of announcement from your son or his wife? Do you see what I mean?”

  “Oh, I do see. I was given an account of her birth by someone dear to me. Someone whose trust is completely above question.”

  “Then give me the name of that person, please.”

  “His name was John, and he was my husband.” She turned her attention away from him to look out the window beside her. “He died from yellow fever not long after the child was born, so I am quite aware of the fevers that killed after the 1855 storm.”

  He sensed he had lost Mrs. Smith’s attention, for she was now looking out the window. Slowly she returned her gaze to meet his.

  “That would be nearly a quarter century now. Oh, how that does make me wonder how it all passed so quickly.”

  Jonah let the silence fall between them, unwilling to speak until his host indicated she was ready to continue their conversation. Finally she sighed and turned back toward him.

  “The world is a different place now,” she said, her voice soft. “I do miss my husband so.”r />
  “I’m so sorry, Mrs. Smith.” He rose. “I should go. Before I do, the last time we met you told me you would give me access to your assistant’s journals. Would those be available?”

  Mrs. Smith nodded and reached for a bellpull beside her chair. A moment later, a maid arrived. “Please ask Miss Winston to join us, and tell her to bring all the journals.”

  The maid hurried away, leaving them alone again. Jonah nodded toward the roses on the mantel. “My mother also has a fondness for roses,” he told her.

  “Beautiful flowers, aren’t they? I am in debt to my dear neighbor Mrs. Brown for these lovely blossoms. She is such a hospitable lady.”

  Jonah smiled at the thought of Mrs. Brown being so free with her favorite flowers. “I have a different recollection in relation to Mrs. Brown and her rose garden. I am afraid her boys and I did our best to sneak into that forbidden part of the garden anytime we thought we could get away with it.”

  “Oh, but she always knew, didn’t she?”

  “Yes,” he said slowly, wondering where this lady got her information, “somehow she always knew.”

  “Excuse me,” the maid said, returning to the room. “Miss Winston has not yet returned from her errands.”

  “Well then,” Mrs. Smith said. “Perhaps you wish to wait, or shall I send a message to you when she returns?”

  “I have other leads I can follow today,” he said.

  “So tomorrow, then?” she asked. “I will see that Miss Winston has the journals ready for you in the morning. Perhaps the family Bible will be found by then as well. Call on us anytime after ten, would you?”

  “I will,” he said then said his goodbyes and made his exit. As he stepped out onto the sidewalk, he spied a familiar person standing across the street.

  “Donovan, is that you?” he called as he waited on a horse and buggy to pass before crossing the street to join his fellow Pinkerton agent. “What are you doing here?”

  “I’m here to see to the security arrangements for the former president’s visit next week,” Detective Donovan said.

  “Since when is that a Pinkerton’s job?” he said as he shook Donovan’s hand.

  “Since the Browns do not want to take any chances that the former president’s security team might miss something.” He nodded toward Mrs. Smith’s home. “Is this where you’re living now?”

  Jonah smiled. “This is my client’s home.”

  “Two Pinkertons working two different cases on the same block of the same street,” Donovan said. “Wonder when that’s ever happened.”

  “I’d say never, but maybe this can work to our advantage. I’m investigating a missing woman. My client doesn’t have a description or any other identifying information other than her late husband told her the girl was born a specific date in 1855.”

  “Not much to go on,” he said. “How’re you going to approach this?”

  “I’m still deciding,” Jonah said.

  Donovan looked past him toward the Smith home. “It sounds like you don’t trust your client is being completely honest with you.”

  He reached over to clasp his hand on Donovan’s shoulder. “That, my friend, is it exactly.”

  “Why take a case like that?”

  “I’ve asked myself that ever since I sat in her parlor drinking tea and listening to her stories several weeks ago.” Jonah shrugged. “There’s something there. Some mystery that needs solving. I’m just not sure that it is the mystery she has hired me to solve.”

  “But you’re going to get to the bottom of it either way.”

  “I am.” He paused to glance back at the Smith home and then returned his attention to his fellow agent. “Something else I could stand to get to the bottom of,” he said.

  “What’s that?” Donovan asked.

  Jonah told him about the holes that had been dug on Cahill property. “That doesn’t bother me so much. It has been happening for years. But the minute someone breaks a lock and gets into the cellar beneath the house while my mother and sister are home, that’s when I take this seriously.”

  Donovan seemed to consider this a moment. “I agree.”

  “I would welcome any ideas you have. I need to be sure my mother and sister are safe, but I also need to approach this as a Pinkerton and not as someone who is too close to the subject.”

  “I would need to see the evidence.”

  “There’s a shovel in police custody, but there isn’t anything unique or identifying about it.” He paused. “You’re welcome to come out to my mother’s home and take a look at the cellar and the marks on the door. I will have to arrange for my sister to take my mother out so she won’t wonder what we are doing.”

  “So she doesn’t know about this?”

  “We haven’t told her yet. My sister doesn’t want to upset her, and so far I agree.”

  The sound of women talking came from across the street. Jonah glanced over to see the cause. Finding nothing out of the ordinary, he went back to his discussion with Donovan.

  Then he heard the scream.

  A few minutes earlier

  Madeline rounded the corner at Broadway Avenue then froze. There, standing across the street in front of the Brown home, was the Pinkerton detective Jonah Cahill. He was in deep conversation with another man, and neither of them was looking her direction.

  Slowly, Madeline retraced her steps until she no longer stood in view of the Pinkerton agent and his companion. She certainly could not return to Madame’s house by way of Broadway Avenue and the front door, so she ducked into a back alley and followed it all the way to the property’s rear gate.

  Though the serving girl’s eyebrows rose when Madeline stepped inside the back of the house, she said nothing. Madeline offered a weak smile and then hurried up the servants’ stairway to her room on the third floor. Dropping her wrapped package of treats onto the writing desk, she hurried to the window where she had a view of the two men still conversing on the sidewalk.

  If she could get the window open, Madeline realized, she might be able to hear the animated discussion going on there. Several tugs later, she gave up on trying to lift the sash of the old windows. Instead, she stepped into the hallway and hurried to the floor-to-ceiling windows at the end of the corridor.

  There she had better luck, although she soon discovered that an overgrown magnolia tree blocked her view. Worse, the sound of the breeze coming off the Gulf of Mexico sent any sounds from the street off in the opposite direction.

  Not to be done in by this small obstacle, Madeline realized if she were to step out onto the small wooden ledge that traversed this side of the home, she might have access to a spot where she could hear the men and yet remain hidden by the foliage.

  One careful step and then another, and soon she could hear Jonah Cahill’s voice. “I would welcome any ideas you have. I need to be sure…,” he said to the other man. “I also need to approach this as a Pinkerton and not as someone who is too close to the subject.”

  Madeline gasped and leaned against the downspout behind her. So Jonah Cahill was following her. Worse, he not only was participating in an investigation that involved her but he also admitted he had been close to Madeline.

  And here he had accused her of investigating him. Of all the nerve.

  “Miss Winston? Is that you out on the ledge?”

  Madeline jumped at the sound of the maid’s voice. Grasping the downspout, she narrowly managed to avoid falling three stories to the lawn below.

  “Yes, Gretchen,” she told the maid as her heart continued to pound out a furious cadence. “Did you need something in particular, or were you merely taking a census of the household staff?”

  “Goodness, Miss Winston, I don’t understand half of what you just asked me, but I am supposed to tell you that Madame Smith wishes to speak with you just as soon as you return from your errands.”

  A salt-scented breeze blew past, causing Madeline to tighten her grip on the downspout. “Well, as you can see, I have returned
from my errands. Would you please tell Madame that I am getting a breath of fresh air and will be down shortly?”

  “Didn’t you breathe none while you were out?”

  “I did,” she said as patiently as she could manage. “However, that was on ground level. I prefer air at least three stories up.”

  The maid looked skeptical but nodded all the same. “All right, then. I’ll see that Madame is told.” A moment later, the window closed behind her.

  “Gretchen, wait,” she said, being careful not to speak so loudly that the men across the street might hear.

  Unfortunately, Gretchen did not hear either.

  Madeline inched her way back to the window, trying to ignore the dizzying difference between where she stood and where she might land if she fell. She tugged on the window sash, but it would not budge.

  Letting out a long breath, she tried again. And again. Either the window was now stuck or the maid had locked it.

  She rested her head against the glass and then began to knock. Of all the time for the staff to be away from their third-floor rooms, it would have to be now.

  What to do? Madeline crept back to the other side of the drainpipe to reach the corner of the house. Though a palm tree hid her from view, if she took another step around the corner, she would be standing on the top of the second-floor porch that ran the length of the front side of the home. Anyone walking down Broadway Avenue could glance up and spot her.

  So could the men who were still chatting across the street. Irritation flared. Eventually she needed to have another conversation with the Pinkerton, preferably with her feet on solid ground.

  Looking around for a solution to her dilemma, Madeline reached out to yank on a palm branch. The tree was solid and easily the biggest of all the palms on the property. Another yank and she determined the branch might hold her weight.

  The question was what to do once she’d grasped the branch and jumped from the roof. Would the branch allow her to sail across the distance between the ledge to the trunk of the tree, or would she be left hanging in midair?