22
Greta

OCTOBER 1915

It was too familiar. The skulking through the theater in the dark of night. Her fear that she’d become separated from Oscar and Eleanor or that someone would catch them in the act of trespassing. But was it trespassing when the owner’s wife had given her the key to the theater’s entrance? It was also too familiar to exit the theater under cover of darkness after having found nothing.

The disappointment was so palpable that it hurt physically. She felt nauseated as she anticipated hearing Leo’s cries for help, this after spending the last hour with Oscar and Eleanor, feeling along the basement walls for cracks, levers, indentations, anything that might lead them to a hidden passageway.

“That was fruitless.” Eleanor heaved an unladylike sigh. Her hair was unkempt and slipping from its chignon. Her navy blue dress shimmered in the moonlight. “We’ve found nothing.”

Greta didn’t know what to say. She wanted to express her gratitude to her friend. Flighty and entitled, Eleanor had more than proven her loyalty and her friendship by just being here. Now, as Greta saw the frustration on Eleanor’s face, she realized that in spite of Eleanor’s initial excitement over the adventure, it had turned into a true hope that Leo and his friends would be found.

“Something is not right.” Oscar kicked at a stone. It was the first outward sign of emotion that Greta had seen in him. He pulled his foot back and cast her a sheepish look as they huddled in the shadows of the back alley. “I’m sorry. I truly thought . . . this shouldn’t be so difficult.”

“It isn’t your fault,” Greta whispered hoarsely around tears.

Eleanor’s arm slipped around Greta’s shoulders in a tender embrace. “Oh, Greta, we’ll find Leo. We’ll put Mr. Barlowe to shame in whatever he’s hiding. We’ll—”

“Don’t make promises,” Greta shushed her friend. “We’re the only ones looking for Leo and the boys. The police can’t be bothered to do anything about their disappearance any longer.”

“Says who?” Eleanor drew back.

“Officer Hargrove.” Greta couldn’t help but look at Oscar. He was watching her, yet his face remained impassive when she mentioned John. Greta didn’t know why it mattered what Oscar thought. That she was beginning to lean on his quiet strength didn’t slip past her, though.

“Well, that is sheer poppycock!” Eleanor frowned. “We must get Daddy involved, Oscar. We must.”

Oscar gave Eleanor a patient smile. “Father can do nothing, and he’s certainly not going to break into the theater with us.”

“Oh, he’d be horrified if he knew we were here!” Eleanor held her fingertips to her mouth as she realized the truth of what she said. “Mama would lock me in my room.”

“We’d best get you home,” Oscar concluded. Eleanor’s words were beginning to sink in, it seemed. The reality of the risks the Boyd siblings had taken in trying to help Greta. He shifted his attention to Greta. “We shall walk you home first.”

“No!” Greta squeaked. At Oscar’s frown, she hurried to explain, “I-I need the time alone to . . . to think.”

“That’s understandable,” Oscar said.

“Yes, but we can’t allow you to walk home alone!” Eleanor added.

“She’s right.” Oscar stepped from the shadow of the theater and into the alleyway. He extended his arm in a gentlemanly gesture Greta felt she hardly deserved.

She backed away. “No, really. I’ll be all right on my own.”

“It’s unseemly,” Eleanor insisted. “Oscar, don’t allow Greta to walk home alone. Not to the south side!”

Greta gave a sad laugh at her friend’s naivete. “I grew up on the south side, Eleanor. I know it well.”

“But you could be ruined,” Eleanor protested.

Greta ached at the fact that what would ruin someone of Eleanor’s status would merely go unnoticed by those in her world. Being alone without a chaperone was more common than the social elite realized. And not all young women faced violence, nor did they experience their reputations being ruined. Instead, their ruination came from poverty or from the lack of marriageable men willing to take on a wife and potential children. They were faced with places such as Grove House, which awaited her. A place where neither Oscar nor Eleanor knew she now lived.

“Please.” Greta moved away from the Boyds. “I will see myself home. Thank you both for your willingness to help me, but you must return to your normal lives. There is nothing but trouble here if you continue. After all you’ve done for me, such as paying my debts to the Barlowes, I could not live with myself should you be forced to sacrifice more.”

With that, Greta spun on her heels and hurried down the dark alley, away from the light and hope that simply being with Oscar and Eleanor brought to her. But mostly away from Leo, and the place she believed he had been lost. A place where he would be lost forever.

Her words of bravery had been spoken without thought to the actual walk to Grove House. Trees that were fast shedding their leaves bordered the road, their scraggly branches grasping at the sky like bony arms and hands. The half-moon kept hiding itself behind clouds, plunging Greta into blackness until she could scarcely make out a stone on the road. Then the moon would taunt her as it peeked out and cast its rays with just enough light to make the world around Greta one of fearful images and shadows.

A bat swooped across the road in front of her. Greta tugged her shawl around her shoulders and increased her pace. She’d left Kipper’s Grove behind, moving swiftly now toward Grove House. She could see the outline of the building on the hillside. It was gray, cold, and unfriendly.

The wind picked up, whipping Greta’s hair around her face and falling free from the braid she’d twisted and pinned up. Now it slapped at her as if in warning, urging her to go back to Kipper’s Grove. To Leo . . . But she couldn’t go back, not with Cecil, Alvin, and Virgil ahead at Grove House.

Greta darted a look over her shoulder. The road, the trees, the sky were all dark—a blue-black darkness that caused a shiver to race through her. She stumbled over a tree root in the road. The ground rushed toward her, and she tried to catch herself with her palms. Her hands struck the dirt and pebbles, scraping her skin. Tears of panic burned in her eyes as she realized she was being followed. Someone was behind her. She clawed at the ground, pushing herself up on her knees. Her foot caught on the hem of her dress. It ripped as she tried to stand. With a cry, Greta plummeted forward a second time.

Greta grappled with her dress, pulling it up above her knees so she could stand and run. A hand closed around her elbow, its grip unyielding. “Let me go!” she screamed. Her hair had plastered itself over her face, and with tears blinding her, she lashed out with her hands. They connected with a firm chest. “Let go!” she shouted again.

“Greta!”

Twisting, she kicked the man’s leg.

“Ow! Greta! Stop, it’s me!”

“Leave me alone!”

Her assailant grabbed her other forearm, holding both her arms up, bent at their elbows. “Greta, please stop!” The man’s glasses reflected the moonlight for a moment. His hair hung around his face, no longer neatly combed off his high forehead.

“Oscar?”

“Yes. It’s me, Oscar.”

Greta stopped struggling. She squinted in the darkness to better see him. Oscar loosened his grip. Greta’s breaths came in gasps, her chest heaving. The wetness from her tears had caused her hair to stick to her cheeks. She reached up, free now from being held, and raked it away.

“Oscar, what are you doing here?” She was relieved, angry, and wanted to throw herself into his arms all at the same time.

Even with his wiry and angular stature, in this moment his presence appeared strong, rugged, even authoritative. His shirt had come untucked from his trousers, the tails hanging below his sweater vest. He ran a hand through his straight hair that fell into his eyes.

He stepped closer to her. “What are you doing here, Greta?”

Greta could read concern, doubt, and even . . . was that hurt in his eyes?

“I took Eleanor home and then hurried to catch up to you. I didn’t feel it safe for you to . . .” He broke off, then continued, “You are past the south side, Greta. Why are you here?”

Greta could tell that Oscar Boyd had already surmised her answer, but he merely wanted to hear the truth from her lips. She refused to look away. The wind caught her words, and Oscar leaned closer. Greta tried again. “You know why I’m here, Oscar.”

“Tell me.” His brows drew together. “After all we have done for you, the least you can do is be honest with me.”

“After all you have done?” Greta shook her head. “I should have known your payment for my debts would come with a price. You will hold it over my head and guilt me into telling you what is not your business to know?”

“That’s not what I meant!” Oscar shouted over the wind.

They stood in the middle of the road, staring at each other, with Grove House looking down on them. Its presence mocked her, laughed at her.

“What did you mean then?” Greta challenged.

“I meant . . .” Oscar waved his arm toward Grove House. “I thought I had earned your trust, Greta. Why would you hide this from me? From Eleanor?”

Greta couldn’t formulate a response. She felt her nostrils flare against the emotion she was holding back.

“Where are your brothers?” Oscar demanded out of concern. “Are they at Grove House? Alone?”

“They’re not alone,” Greta choked out. Although the boys’ supervision was being carried out by strangers. Strangers who had already determined it was their right to decide the Mercy family’s future.

“How long have you been living at Grove House?” Oscar asked.

“It all happened so fast,” Greta said, finally admitting it. Frustration and failure plagued her thoughts. The dreadful knowing that she had let her brothers down. Let Leo down. What would her parents and Gerard say if they were here? “They came for us two days ago. I didn’t have a choice.”

“You could have asked us for help!” Oscar insisted.

“What would you have done? The risk of telling you was greater than that of not!”

Oscar reached out and held her shoulders. The wind swept her skirts around his legs, embracing them both. “What risk was there in being truthful with us?”

Greta couldn’t speak around the lump in her throat. What could she say? The risk of losing them? Were Eleanor and Oscar even hers to lose? They weren’t her family. They could never be family. They were worlds apart, and yet they were the closest she had to kinship.

“What risk?” Oscar said again, this time with a little shake of her shoulders.

“Losing you!” she cried.

Oscar looked taken aback. His grasp on her shoulders loosened.

“I mean . . .” Greta scrambled to explain. “Eleanor. You—”

Oscar dropped his hands.

Greta’s breath came in short shudders, pressing down on her. Every regret filled her with shame. She’d exposed not only her growing reliance on Oscar to Oscar but also to herself. It stunned her. Embarrassed her.

Oscar raked his hand through his hair again. Agitated. He looked over his shoulder toward Grove House, then back to her. “Let me walk you home,” he stated simply.

Greta searched his eyes. He didn’t avert his attention, and together they expressed the questions, the anxious awareness of their circumstances, and the unspoken words that would have to remain that way. Unspoken.