Crimson Snow (5 page)

She was awakened by a pounding on her door and Maggie's harsh voice. “It's past six. If you're sick you'd better say so. If you're gettin' up, you're half an hour late, and Old Sourpuss'll have your hide.”

Hilda pushed aside the blankets, washed her face in the icy water in her basin, and dressed as fast as she could. The room was so cold she could see her breath. Anton had only just fired up the furnace, and it took a long time for the heat to reach the top story.

Shivering, yawning, and out of sorts, she hastened down the long winding flights of stairs to begin her day's work.

Her first duty, before her breakfast, was to wash away the ever-present soot in the reception rooms on the first floor: the great hall, the morning room, the drawing room, and the rest. Winter and summer, it was the same. Hilda could never decide which was the worst culprit: the coal-burning furnace that warmed the house, or the coal-burning power plants for the city's many factories, or the coal fires in the fireplaces. The drawing room, with its ivory paint and light-colored wallpaper, was the biggest job. Every sooty speck showed. Hilda was usually particular about that room. She was proud of it, as she was proud of the whole mansion.

This morning it got short shrift. Her mind dwelt on other things, and most of them were not pleasant.

It wasn't fair of Patrick to drop such a bombshell and then just leave, she thought as she beat a cushion furiously and returned it to its place on a window seat. If there wasn't time to talk about it properly, he should have kept his peace. How was a girl supposed to get her work done when her mind was in such turmoil?

Of course it was all impossible. They both knew perfectly well that they couldn't marry. Her thoughts started down the same old dreary path: She would have to give up her job. But she didn't like her job anymore. And if Patrick was making good money, she might not need to work.

“Hah!” she said aloud. “An Irish immigrant never makes that much money.”

Some of them did, though. Daniel Malloy, Patrick's uncle, was rich, and he'd been just as poor as anyone when he came to America. Then there were the politicians she'd heard of in New York, the organization called Tammany Hall. She'd read both good and bad things about them in the newspapers (depending on which paper she was reading, the Republican
Tribune
or the Democratic
Times)
, but all agreed that they were rich.

What would it be like to be rich? She paused, duster in hand, and stared out the window. There was nothing to see. Dawn wouldn't come for at least another hour. But her mind's eye saw a house the size of Uncle Dan's, lush with handsome furnishings. She had never even imagined being mistress of such a house, as she had never imagined being mistress of Tippecanoe Place. Such grandeur was not for poor immigrants. How would it feel, sleeping as late as she wanted in the morning, having nothing to do but give orders to servants…?

“Hah!” she said again, blinking the vision away. She'd had enough of ordering servants about right here at Tippecanoe Place. It wasn't as easy as people thought. The under-housemaids almost never did exactly what she wanted. They arrived late and pleaded, on one pretext or another, to leave early. They broke things and skimped on the work. Hilda spent as much time checking their work and scolding them as she did on her own assigned tasks. In her own home she wanted none of that bother. Easier to do most things oneself, perhaps with a married couple to come in by day for gardening and laundry and the heaviest labor.

Her own home. Was it possible that she would ever have one? But Mama and Mrs. Cavanaugh—if they agreed on nothing else, they agreed that a marriage between Hilda and Patrick was
a bad thing
. And Hilda's mind was back on the same path again, endlessly treading the weary arguments she'd had with herself scores of times.

At breakfast she ate silently, too distracted to take part in the gossip of the other servants. But when she and Janecska had gone upstairs to do the family's bedrooms, the daily was eager to talk.

“Have you heard, Hilda?” she asked, as they made the big bed in the master bedroom.

“Heard what? The blanket, it must go down on your side. About an inch.”

“About Miss Jacobs. They say she—”

“Not so far. And smooth it properly. And the pillow on your side must be plumped.”

“Hilda, are you listening to me? Miss Jacobs met a man last night.”

Hilda's attention was finally caught. “She could not have met a man last night. She was dead.”

“I mean the night before last, the night she died. She left her boarding house—you know she boarded with Mrs. Gibbs.”

“Yes. And roomed with Mrs. Schmidt.”

Janecska nodded, the pillow in her arms. “Just down the street. Well, anyway, on her way home after supper, she met Mr. Barrett.”

“Oh. I know that. It was in the paper.”

“Colonel George knows him, doesn't he?”

“Yes, they know each other. Mr. Barrett visits here.”

“He's an important man, isn't he?”

Hilda didn't like the way this conversation was going. “I suppose so. Most of the men who know Colonel George are important. Are you going to stand there all day hugging that pillow?”

Janecska beat it into shape and put it back on the bed. “Anyway, what I was going to tell you isn't about Mr. Barrett. He walked with her only a little way. He's lame, you know, so he walks slowly, and she caught up with him. They talked, only a few words, and then he went into his house and she went on. And what do you think happened then?”

“I will never know, if you do not hurry with your story!”

“Well, I thought you'd want to know, because of Erik and all, but if you don't care—”

“Janecska, we have work to do. Please tell me, but quickly.”

Deprived of her dramatic moment, Janecska continued sullenly. “Well, she met another man, that's what.”

Hilda shook her head impatiently. “Of course she met another man! The man who killed her. Everyone knows that!”

“Well, then, I suppose you know what he looks like!” Janecska tossed her head and went into the next room.

The temptation was too much for Hilda. She followed. “No, I do not know what he looks like. Have the police found that out already?”

“Someone saw him! A neighbor was looking out her window and saw a tall man wearing a long overcoat. And he had a light brown mustache. So there!”

There was blood on the cab wheels, the floor, the walls.

—South Bend
Tribune
   
January 23, 1904

 

 

 

5

H
ILDA SPENT A MOMENT searching her memory for a tall man with a light brown mustache before common sense reasserted itself. “And how could she see all that? Miss Jacobs was going home after her supper. It must have been dark outside.” She gestured to the bed and turned her attention to the dressing table.

Janecska frowned and ran her duster over the carved head-board. “I don't know…but she did. My cousin knows a woman who knows her, the woman who saw the man, I mean, and he said—my cousin, I mean—”

Hilda dismissed it with an impatient toss of her head. “I do not believe she saw anything at all. That alley, it runs from Colfax to Water Street, about halfway between Scott Street and LaPorte Avenue. There is no streetlight nearby. It is a very dark place to walk at night. If anyone saw anything, it might have been just the shape of a man, but not a mustache!”

“Well, that's what she
said
she saw!” Janecska was growing cross. Her sensation wasn't getting at all the reception she had hoped. She put the duster down and began to tug recklessly at the lace-edged sheets.

“Who is this woman who saw these things, or says she did?”

“I told you. A neighbor. She was looking out her window—”

“What window? Where? How near was she? And when did this happen?”

“How do you expect me to know all that! All I know is, that's what she saw, and if you don't believe it—well, you don't have to!”

“Janecska, do you not see that it matters where she was, this woman? If she was upstairs, looking out a second-story window, she would be looking down at the man. So how could she tell if he was tall? And it matters whether the streetlight was in the direction she was looking, or to her back—”

“So you
are
gonna find out who the killer is? They all said you was gonna try.”

“I—who said?” Hilda stood with a silver-backed hairbrush in one hand and the polishing cloth in the other.

“Them, downstairs. Sarah and Anna and that Anton.” Janecska tossed her head. She had an eye for Anton but wouldn't admit it, because he was German and she was Polish. “Anton says you're famous. He says you solve all the murders around here. Just like you found out who was killing those young boys last year.”

Hilda recovered and began to polish the brush to within an inch of its life. “They are all wrong. I have no reason to try to find Miss Jacobs's killer. What are the police for? Janecska, you have not dusted in the cracks. Pay attention to your work!”

She could squelch the young maid, but she couldn't silence the conversation later on at the servants' luncheon table. Mr. Williams, afflicted with a bad cold, had left the table early, so tongues wagged freely.

Maggie had heard the same story Janecska had, but in more detail. “A Mrs. Bruggner,” she said. “She lives just two doors east of the alley, at Mrs. Carpenter's. She has the second floor, but she was visiting with Mrs. Carpenter in the first-floor parlor after supper. The parlor has a bay window on the street. When they heard the scream—”

“Scream!” said Elsie, dropping her soupspoon into the fish chowder.

“There, now, look what you've gone and done,” said Mrs. Sullivan. “Anyone would think you'd been brought up in a stable. You clean up that mess, girl. Not with your napkin! Go and get a cloth from the kitchen, and see you soak the tablecloth after we've finished eating.”

“What scream?” asked Anton, keeping to the point.

“They heard a scream, the two women,” said Maggie, “and looked out the window to see what it might be. And they saw a man stopped just at the end of the alley. He was tall and wore a long overcoat, and had a mustache.”

Hilda had the same objections she'd had before. “How could they see all that? The streetlight is far away.”

“But there was a full moon that night, remember? And there was fresh snow, and you know how that makes the night brighter. What with all that and the streetlight, they could see plain as plain, they said.”

“I told you,” murmured Janecska, but so quietly that Hilda wasn't quite sure she'd heard.

Hilda knew she shouldn't pursue the subject. She didn't want to add more fuel to the fire of speculation about her course of action. But her curiosity got the better of her. “Did they see Miss Jacobs, too?” It was the sort of question anyone might ask, after all.

“No. At least not that I heard,” said Maggie. “They reckon she was already in the alley, running away from him.”

“Oh, he was running? Then how could the women see him so plainly?”

“No, he was just standing there, I guess.” Maggie scowled. “How do I know? I wasn't there! If you're so nosy, why don't you ask some of those police friends of yours? I thought you said you weren't going to get mixed up in it.”

“I am not. I am worried, that is all. I have four sisters who must walk to work every morning and back home every night, and this time of year it is dark for both trips. Of course I want the police to find the man who did this, and in a hurry, so that women like us can be safe again! If you are not interested, why do you talk about it so much?”

She glared at Maggie. Mrs. Sullivan sighed and pushed her chair back from the table. “I'm sure I don't know why you two girls can't learn to get along. Help me clear, and then you can have your rests, but don't let me catch you taking advantage just because Mr. Williams isn't feeling well.”

The gossip and rumor about the murder had kept Hilda from dwelling on her own problems most of the morning, but the moment she was alone in her room, they flooded back. After almost no sleep, she was tired and irritable, but she knew she was too edgy to rest. She looked longingly at her bed and then, with sudden resolution, flung her cloak over her uniform, pulled on her oldest hat, and ran back downstairs.

“I am going out for a few minutes, Mrs. Sullivan,” she called into the kitchen as she passed. “I will be back soon.”

“Where're you headed, then?” shouted the cook, but Hilda was gone.

She hadn't bothered with rubbers since her destination was only two blocks away. She was sorry before she was halfway down the back drive. Several inches of new snow had fallen overnight. It worked its way into her shoes and made the footing even more treacherous than the day before. She half slid the last few feet to the sidewalk and had to walk carefully the rest of the way, instead of running as she longed to do.