The Daring Ladies of Lowell (27 page)

Samuel.
“I’m sorry, Dr. Stanhope, I have to go,” Alice said quickly. Maybe there was still time.

S
he ran—past the playground, past Boott Boardinghouse 52. She was almost to the bridge. Let him still be there, please let him be there. She saw the bench through the night mist; was there a figure sitting there, or was it her imagination?

There was no one there.

Alice collapsed onto the bench. She opened the pouch of her bag and pulled out a small handkerchief, inhaling its freshly laundered smell and pressing it tight to her eyes. Samuel, Samuel, how long did you wait? I wanted to be here; there is no denying it. And what had her not showing up told him? That she cared not at all; that she had made a promise she had no intention of fulfilling.

A slight breeze rustled through the leaves of a small boxwood shrub to the right of the bench, and Alice held her breath. But no one was approaching.

She had decided to tell him the truth tonight.
Honesty.
He said the word so bluntly, it had reached deep inside her. But what was it? She might have revealed too much. Oh, what did it matter now, and how does anyone give up all hidden thoughts and survive?

The breeze was playing now with her hair, and she looked up to the stars, feeling some peace in gazing at so much beauty, so far away. She stood, ready to head home, and almost tripped over a long stick of wood lying at her feet. She picked it up, puzzled. It was a sign of some sort—she turned over a piece of canvas nailed to the stick and saw the bright red message scrawled on the other side:

STRIKE MEETING SUNDAY NIGHT

Alice read it, then reread. No matter how she stared at the words, they would not say anything else, and they began to calm her. There was only one thing to do. Her turmoil eased, and she walked home with a steady pace.

S
amuel stood on the balcony, barely registering the stars, doing the best he could to quell his own emotions. Two hours, he had spent on that bench. At some point, he had begun to feel like a fool. He could be angry; he had a right to be angry. He couldn’t have stated his feelings more plainly this morning. And he had seen in her eyes a sudden connecting spark that had given him a day of mounting hope. No, something changed, she had shifted direction, without the courtesy of letting him know.

Reluctantly he lowered his eyes and stared out toward Boott Hall. There would be no sleep tonight. He wanted now only to see this trial over, to walk away, to turn his back on all of Lowell. He curled his fists tight around the cold balcony railing. He was a dreamer, a stupid dreamer. Hiram would have a good laugh over that.

F
inal arguments began the next morning, the crisp, clipped voices of Mason and Greene pounding home their opposing arguments. The case against his client was all circumstantial and could not stand up to examination, Mason announced with scorn. The evidence was sloppy, vague, and given by hysterical witnesses on a witch hunt, people of weak character determined to pin a possible murder on a man of the cloth whose religious affiliation they rejected. And was it murder? There still was no proof of an actual crime! The unfortunate Miss Cornell, having reached the end of the line with her easy sexual favors, had found herself pregnant. Shamed, she had committed suicide. An old and familiar story. “If you were to seek for some of the vilest monsters in wickedness and depravity, you would find them in the female form,” he declared.

This trial was no witch hunt, Albert Greene declared when it was his turn. The people of Lowell had responsibly done what they could to bring a murderer to justice—the fact that it was “a man of the cloth” who had done the deed was irrelevant. Did Lovey Cornell commit suicide? “Impossible,” he told the court. No woman could have hung herself like that; no woman could have inflicted those wounds and bruises on her body by herself. And though the defense was determined to deny it, the letters found in this unfortunate girl’s trunk were clearly traceable to Ephraim Avery. His motive was clear—he had impregnated her, and he solved his problem by murdering her.

Only near the end of his summation did Greene clear his throat and speak to the destruction of Lovey’s character by Mason. “Nothing has given me more unpleasant feelings during this trial than the attempts to impeach the character of that young woman,” he said slowly. “I find it sad and astonishing that the defense has fought so hard to blame her for her own death. This extraordinary attack—which will find its place in our legal history—is meant to tell us that a young woman like this with nowhere to turn is expendable. And that leaves a shadow on our system of justice.”

The courtroom was very still. Greene stood silently, legs spread, his hands linked behind his back. Finally he looked up at the judge. “That is all, Your Honor.” He sat down, but not before locking eyes coldly for a long moment with Hiram Fiske.

“Thank you,” Alice whispered under her breath. She strained to catch a glimpse of Samuel, who sat with his father in their usual place up front. There he was, jaw firm as stone, without expression, looking neither to right or left. If he understood how true Greene’s words were, surely he would show some sign of emotion. But his face showed nothing.

C
hief Justice Eddy gave final instructions to the jury shortly before five in the evening. The jurors then filed out of the jury box and vanished through a door leading to the room where they were supposed to sit across from one another at a long table and try to sort out truth from lies. It looked to Alice as if that mantle of responsibility was falling a bit too heavily on their shoulders.

The judge banged his gavel one last time. “Court is adjourned. When a verdict is reached, the courthouse bell will ring.” He stood and, followed by the others, left the room.

I
t was a warm evening. The crowd drifted off, many in it glancing backward as if loathe to break the invisible cord binding them to the courthouse. It would not be good to stray too far, some murmured. The verdict could come, surely, anytime.

Alice lifted her face to the waning sunlight, walking slowly, trying to exhale the musty smells of the sweat and the dust of the courthouse from her nostrils. She looked neither to right nor to left; she would not tolerate in herself any search for Samuel.

Ahead of her, she saw the doctor outside his surgery, tending his small garden. Alice’s step quickened. She had a goal now.

“Dr. Stanhope, did everything work out properly this morning?”

“Yes,” he said, with a small smile. “All went peaceably.”

“I’m glad,” she said. There was so much more to ask, but she feared being overheard.

“She has a chance,” he said softly. “The sister was kind.”

“Why don’t you join us at the boardinghouse for dinner?” she heard herself asking.

He scrambled to his feet. “Too much to do here,” he said. He looked flustered. “Dinner? Oh, I hardly—” But then he ran out of anything to say.

Alice smiled. “Please,” she said.

D
inner was calm, a swirl of slow-moving parts, all ears straining for the one sound that mattered. Stanhope, his face scrubbed to the hue of an apple, took a second helping of brisket and actually conversed with Mrs. Holloway on the value of medicinal plants. There were no jokes, no laughing. And no one sang or played the piano tonight, and all knew why. But, at least, all who cared about Lovey were together.

Alice drifted out to the porch, inhaling the crisp night air as deeply as she could. She even impulsively wrapped her arms around a pillar—this tangible place was hers, and she would try to hold on to it, come what may.

And she waited.

S
o did Samuel. Not watching the stars or searching for a glimpse of Boott Hall but in a darkened room hazy with the cigar smoke puffed out in agitated bursts by his brother, Jonathan.

“I couldn’t have made a difference by testifying,” Jonathan said. “It would have just thrown the trial into an unholy mess.”

A small cough from a wing chair by the fireplace. “Can you put that cigar out please? I’m getting a headache,” said Daisy.

Samuel was silent.

“Damn it, Samuel, stop blaming me, will you?” Jonathan was puffing harder than ever. He stood, paced. “The verdict isn’t in, for God’s sake. They’ll convict him.”

“I don’t think so,” Daisy said unexpectedly. “They don’t have the courage.”

“You too? You’ll turn on me, my own sister?”

Daisy said nothing. She picked at a ragged fingernail and pulled herself, tight and small, back into the chair.

“Don’t you feel anything for that dead girl?” Samuel said through clenched teeth.

Jonathan paled. He sat abruptly, and his fingers drummed nervously on the table next to his chair. He tried to say something, but all he could do was look pleadingly to his brother.

There was no getting around it; it was done. Samuel entwined the fingers of both hands and held them to his face. Jonathan was not a villain, not a bad man. He would replay this decision of obedience to Father all his life, or was he, Samuel, just casting an overlay that was his and his alone?

There was a sound. Jonathan stopped pacing. Samuel leaned forward; Daisy started to rise.

The door opened and Hiram Fiske walked in. “Put out that cigar,” he ordered his younger son. “And stop listening for the bell. There will be no decision tonight.”

Not that one, Samuel thought. But another, yes. Soon.

T
he courthouse bells, heavy and forceful, rang at eleven o’clock Sunday morning.

Alice pulled on a shawl and prepared to rush down the stairs of the boardinghouse; she must hurry, the courthouse would be jammed. Mary-o came running after her, grasping her in a brief, tight hug, casting about for something to say.

“We will prevail,” she said with shaky bravado.

Alice kissed her forehead and ran.

“F
inally,” the woman next to her murmured as she slipped into a seat. Alice braced herself, staring at the bedraggled crew filing into the jury box, watching them wince as they put their bottoms down on the hard, unforgiving bench for the last time. Weeks of sitting there; soon they would be free. She could see the relief on their faces.

Now the chief justice’s voice was cutting sharply into the crowd, drawing every eye and ear, stopping every whisper.

“Gentlemen of the jury, have you reached a verdict?” he said, his voice booming through the courthouse, reverberating back from every dusty corner.

“We have, Your Honor,” said Eleazer Trevett, the foreman.

Avery stood immobile, back slightly stooped, fingers twisting a handkerchief.

“Mr. Foreman, is the prisoner guilty or not guilty?”

There was not a sound, not a single drawing in or exhalation of breath.

Trevett’s wobbly voice cut through the stillness.

“Not guilty.”

A man swore and rose to his feet, fist in the air, shaking it at the jury. All through the courthouse, people were scrambling up, some screaming at the jury, some standing on the benches to shout, others cheering the verdict.

Avery whipped around, thrust his chest forward, his expression triumphant. He was staring right at Alice. Standing now, she stared back, fighting against the surge of the shouting crowd. Avery’s backers had pushed into the courtroom with a mighty roar, cheering the jury members, all of whom were trying to escape the jury box as fast as they could.

Avery was free? No, no, it couldn’t be. She could not absorb it.

“Order! Order!” shouted the judge. Bailiffs were pushing into the courtroom, swinging sticks. Avery’s lawyers were trying to usher him out the side door, but the crowd was hard to clear. He was so close now, Alice could see the hardness of his face, the grooves carved deep down to his chin. So close, she fancied she could inhale the acrid smell of his breath.

“You killed her,” she screamed. “Admit it.”

He spat.

She felt released, almost joyful, as she plunged toward him, raising her hand, raising it high.

“Alice, no!” Samuel was suddenly next to her, grabbing her arm, pulling her away.

“I want to hit him,” she said, struggling to free herself.

“I’ve got her, don’t touch her,” Samuel was shouting, pushing away a bailiff, grabbing her arms. “Alice, it’s me.” He panted. “Let me get you out of here.”

She shrieked, struggling against him.

“You’re bleeding, I’m taking you to the surgery,” Samuel said, half pulling, half carrying her to get her away from the uproar inside the courthouse.

“They found him not guilty,” she cried. “How could they do that?”

“They are fools, stupid fools,” he shouted back.

They reached the surgery, Samuel still gripping her tightly as they entered, fearing she might break away and run back. They could hear angry voices, running feet, outside. Alice collapsed into a chair, stunned.

Stanhope was suddenly there, breathing hard after making his way from the courthouse. He peered at her, frowning. “Are you hurt?” he said.

“It’s just my lip, I’m fine.” She almost felt again the warm spit from Avery’s mouth on her cheek, and once more the urge to hit him made her shake.

A sudden sharp sound of loud voices rose from outside. “Avery had better leave town quickly,” Samuel said. “Not a good day when a guilty man goes free.”

This was the firm Fiske voice, the voice of authority that would give pause to anyone. An umbrella of protection for others snapped open at will—and closed at will.

“Perhaps your family should have thought of that earlier,” Alice said. Her eyes were cold, and he looked away. There was nothing for him to say. Nothing was enough anymore.

A quick, hard knock on the door. Stanhope stood and tugged at his jacket as he faced Samuel. “Mr. Fiske, I’m going to be direct with you about what else is going on here,” he began. A quick clearing of the throat. “Those people at the door are here to find out if I’m going to tonight’s labor meeting.”

“I know about the meeting,” Samuel said. “What do you plan to tell them?”

“I’m going to be there,” Benjamin Stanhope said quietly. “I favor reforms, Mr. Fiske, not violence of any sort. They’re here to ask me to join them, and I am going to say yes. I’ve seen enough of young girls with ruined lungs who cough up cotton.”

The room was silent. Samuel stared at him, his gaze steady. “I respect you for that,” he said finally.

“Thank you.” Stanhope walked to the door and opened it.

“Eight o’clock, Doctor. Are you coming?” said a strained voice.

“Yes, I’ll be there.” He closed the door and turned back to the others, seemingly unsure of what to say or do next. “A plaster for your lip,” he said to Alice, peering at her face.

“I’ll put it on,” Samuel said quickly, reaching for it. Anything to touch and comfort her.

“It’s not bleeding anymore, thank you.”

This time, she was the one who turned away.