Slade stepped on stocking feet into the hallway and paused, listening. From below came distant kitchen noises, and a muted humming sounded from down the hall. He hadn’t the time to waste trying to pinpoint it. He had already been trapped here half an hour talking to a reminiscing servant. Satisfied no one was about, he headed down the stairs.
Five days in Baltimore already, and this was the first time he had been left alone in Devereaux Hughes’s house. Every other day he had been expected to go to the rail office and play the part of detective out to ensure the security of the rails.
Under normal circumstances, it would have been a fine job. But it was a cover story on top of a cover story, and it had kept him from what he was really here to do.
The evenings had been spent across the street. The elder Mrs. Hughes had made it downstairs for dinner twice now, apparently the first time in months, and a big to-do had been made over her. Slade had barely managed to be polite, knowing as he did that she was the one who had raised her sons to be snakes.
But tonight he and Hughes would dine in, so he had gone now to visit his mother—and his molly, if that’s what the younger Mrs. Hughes was. Didn’t much matter to Slade. Whether accomplice or ignorant of his dealings, she was still Hughes’s woman. She still set Slade’s nerves to twitching, and she still unsettled him with that feline gaze of hers. He’d been quite happy to stay here this afternoon.
He crept down the hallway as if headed for the library, satisfied no one was nearby. A few days ago he’d seen his host leaving the corner room, locking it behind him, so he assumed that was the one he wanted. A study, he would bet.
It was, of course, still locked. Hence the pick in his pocket. He inserted the tool into the keyhole, his watchful gaze on the hallway and ears on alert. But the only sound he heard was the faint click of the tumbler. A moment later he eased open the door, slipped in, and shut it behind him.
Twilight possessed the room. This window overlooked the street at the Hughes family home, which meant he would see when the man was returning, but there was little light left to shine upon the mahogany desk and matching shelves, and he certainly wasn’t daft enough to bring in a lamp.
He would just have to be quick, before the last of the day faded away.
Not that he knew what he was looking for. Given their desperation in bringing him into the circle, they likely had no firm plans. But they would try something sometime, as they had before. Surratt and Booth had regaled him the other night with the tale of their first botched attempt to kidnap Lincoln on his way to his inauguration.
Kidnap. Pinkerton had thought it an assassination plan and had recommended Mr. Lincoln separate from the rest of his group, that he go through Baltimore under cover of darkness and in disguise rather than risk the triumphant arrival he had planned.
And so when the two Johns and their compatriots arrived at President Street Station, waiting for “King Abraham” to debark from the train and board a carriage to take him to the next one at Camden Station, they found only Mrs. Lincoln and her entourage.
Slade had managed to hide his smirk in his coffee, but it had been close. The papers had lambasted Lincoln for his so-called cowardice, apparently convinced there had been no attempt on his life because, well, there had been no attempt on his life.
They didn’t seem to realize that was an indicator of a job well done on the part of Slade and his colleagues.
Now to do the same again. Ideally he would find something here to indicate future plans.
The desk seemed the most logical place for anything of interest to reside, so he headed there first. The top was cleared of all but a single sheet of paper with a list of railroad employees. He sat in Hughes’s chair and reached for the bottom drawer.
Unlocked—not a good sign. He pulled it open anyway, but a growl formed in his throat. More railroad documents. Employee records, complaints that had been filed, ledgers. “Blast.”
He scrubbed a hand over his face and made himself pause. God, You sent men into the Promised Land to scout it out, right? And You sent me here. So please, if You could help me find what I need…please.
He rolled the kink out of his shoulders and surveyed the dim room. Where to look next?
Bookshelves lined one wall. Not filled, but enough tomes took up residence that the thought of paging through each and every one made his pulse keep time to the clock. Seeing nothing else in the room of promise, though, he headed for them. His breath whooshed out when three letters on one of the spines caught his eye. An Authentic Exposition of the KGC.
They had a book. What kind of secret society actually had a book? Slade pulled it out and flipped to the first page. Four years old, and who knew how accurate. It could have been produced by the group to put out misinformation. Still, it was worth looking through.
Movement out the window caught his eye, and he flattened himself against the shelf. Hughes was on the opposite sidewalk, strolling arm-in-arm with his brother’s widow as if it were a fine summer’s day and not a frosty winter’s eve. They paused where the walkway to her door intersected their path, and it seemed from the angle of his body that he would bid her farewell and cross the street.
Blast it to pieces. Even if he hurried, there was no way he could make his room again before Hughes gained the door. He could duck into another room down here, but his host was the type who would notice his lack of shoes and wonder about it. And tearing through the house wouldn’t escape the servants’ notice.
He had to try something, though. He moved but then froze again when Mrs. Hughes looked past her companion. To his house. At the very window Slade stood beside. Had his movement caught her eye? Was she even now readying to point him out to Hughes? Maybe she assumed it a servant. Please, Lord. Please.
Or maybe she hadn’t seen him at all, for she smiled up at Hughes and motioned toward her own house as she tugged on his arm.
Slade took a breath, aware only then that he had been holding it. Hughes was walking with her toward her front door.
Thank You, Lord. He replaced the book—a good thing he hadn’t darted out of the room with that still in his hand—and made for the door.
Two minutes later he was back in the relative safety of his own chamber. As close calls went, that hadn’t been too bad. There had been no weapons aimed at his head, no enemy a mere hair’s breadth away. But it had still been a close call.
And he still didn’t like them.
Fool man. Marietta stood at her bedroom window on Saturday morning and watched the carriage roll away from Dev’s house with him and Mr. Osborne inside. He wouldn’t work long today, but that just meant he would likely spend the afternoon here, and his guest with him.
The guest who would have gotten caught in Dev’s study last night if she hadn’t urged Dev back into her house.
Why had Mr. Osborne waited to search? He’d surely known Dev wouldn’t be long gone.
Though she had her doubts he had found anything there. If Dev were now the captain of the castle under her house, he had only assumed the role after Lucien’s death. Which meant that if there were any documentation pertaining to the group, it would have originated with Lucien. Would have been, if anywhere accessible, in his study.
Her fingers slid down the edge of the velvet drape. She hadn’t even ventured into that room since the funeral. It still shouted Lucien in its every appointment, and she hadn’t wanted the reminder of him while his brother secretly courted her. The household accounts were already in her small desk, and she had asked Norris, the aging butler, to fetch the bank ledgers for her. She knew there had been business records there too, which were obviously Dev’s domain now.
But he hadn’t moved them, at least not many of them. She had offered to have it all crated up and sent across the street, but he had just taken her hand and said he would rather have the excuse to visit.
No doubt he wanted to keep his roots firmly planted within these walls that meant so much to him.
If those were still here, though, what else was?
She turned when the door opened and Cora slipped in. Perfect. She would dress and do a little investigating of her own.
“Morning, Miss Mari.” Cora eased the door shut behind her and headed toward the boudoir, though she paused beside the bed.
Marietta frowned. The woman had been moving slower of late. Not just from her changing shape, but in a way that bespoke distress. “Are you well?”
Cora’s startled gaze flew her way and then darted back to where it had been—the Bible on her bedside table. “I’m fine, ma’am. You want the lavender or the gray this morning?”
“Gray.” And was it that unthinkable that she would have a Bible out? Granted, it had been on her shelf all these years. But she had still read it regularly, more or less. The pages had merely been in her mind rather than before her physical eyes.
She sighed and sank down onto the edge of her feather-filled mattress. Perhaps it was unthinkable. Which spoke to her need for it. Hence why she had fetched it last night. She had wanted the feel of leather. The weight of pages.
She had wanted it to be real. Not just memory. Not just words.
“Here we are.” Cora reemerged, her arms full of fabric. As she set the layers on the floor—hoop, petticoat, bum roll, more petticoats, and finally the dress itself—Marietta shrugged out of her dressing gown and positioned her corset over her chemise, hooking it up the front.
The laces remained well tied, so she slipped the corset cover overtop and turned back to Cora.
The woman still knelt on the floor straightening petticoats. Her hair hung in perfect midnight spirals, her complexion smooth and even. She was a pretty girl. A fact Marietta had noted upon joining the family, yes, but had then pushed from her mind. She hadn’t wanted to consider that her husband owned a beautiful young slave girl. The worry had been somewhat put to rest when Walker strode back into her world and married Cora within a fortnight, the first baby following directly.
Were they happy, her childhood friend and this woman who now straightened and rubbed a hand at the small of her back? She had never paused to wonder. Certainly never asked.
Her heart tightened within her chest. Who in the world had she become these last few years, that she never looked past her own nose?
Cora emptied her countenance of the pain pinching it and held out a hand. Marietta put hers into it and stepped over her skirts into the center of the hoop. “Is your back paining you, Cora? My sister-in-law complained of terrible back pain when she was expecting.”
Cora withdrew her fingers so fast, Marietta wobbled. “Nothin’ to worry about, ma’am. Just a twinge is all.”
Twinge? Images flashed through her mind’s eye. “You are always hobbling by nightfall. Would it help to stretch out midday? Laura said it eased her discomfort.”
Cora moved behind her and pulled up the mass of skirts, tying the hoop tight around her waist. “Can’t, ma’am. You’s shorthanded, and there be cleanin’ to do.”
“Your health is more important than the furniture getting dusted every day.” The words felt right on her lips, in her heart. And yet foreign. Which made her stomach churn.
The first, thin petticoat fell into place, and Cora went to work positioning the bum roll. “Miss Lucy’s mighty particular, ma’am.”
“I can handle Mother Hughes. Consider this an order, Cora. I want you to rest after your midday meal for an hour.”
The only indication the girl heard her was a momentary pause. Then she fastened the heavier petticoats over the roll.
Marietta pressed a hand to her fluttering middle before slipping her arms through her sleeves. Why was it so unsettling to be having an actual conversation with her servant? As a child, those who worked for them had been family. Walker and her brothers had been inseparable, their mothers best friends.
Yet she didn’t even know if Cora loved Walker. Hadn’t seen their daughter since she was a babe. They kept her in the carriage house all the time, a place Marietta had always avoided. “How is…” the name sprang to mind, yet had she ever even said it? “Elsie?”
The tug upon her waist felt angry. “Good.” She might as well have screamed, Why are you asking?
Marietta squeezed her eyes shut. “Have you and Walker made any decisions about what you will do after the amendment passes? I know your mother will stay, but…”
But she couldn’t, suddenly, imagine Cora remaining here. Not now that she enumerated the many times resentment had sparked in her eyes.
“Don’t know. But don’t you worry, I’m sure you’ll find other black folks to clean your house and muck out your stalls if we leave.”
She deserved that. Still, it stung. “Well. If you need references, do let me know.” Paltry, but she could hardly undo four years of ignoring the girl in one conversation.
Her bodice felt smooth against her chest, telling her the last of the buttons had been fastened. Cora stepped away. “I’ll go tell Tandy to ready your breakfast.”
“Not yet. I need to do some sorting first. I shall be in Lucien’s study if anyone needs me.”
Cora froze, discarded dressing gown dangling from her fingers. “His study?”
Marietta moved to the mirror and the combs and snoods strewn over her vanity top. “Is there a problem?”
“Mr. Dev said ain’t no one to go in there, even to clean.”
“He didn’t mean me, I daresay.” Her first instinct had been to slip in unnoticed, but why? She picked up a comb and turned back to the girl. “And what business is it of his if I do?”
Cora pressed her lips together and straightened the rest of the way. “I sure ain’t gonna tell him.”
“Well, then.” She rolled her hair back, secured it with the combs and lace, and then headed downstairs.
Cigar smoke clung to the study. From Lucien, or had Dev been enjoying his brother’s collection of Cubans? A thick layer of dust covered the shelves, motes danced in the air.
Her eyes slid shut, but she still saw the room. Only now Lucien sat behind the solid mahogany desk, sunlight catching on his burnished blond hair and twining around the tendrils of smoke from his cigar. How many times had she come in here and found him in almost exactly the same position?
Three hundred twenty-two.
And each time he had looked up and shot her the grin that had made her determine to marry him. The one that said she was all he wanted, all he needed.
How she had wanted that to be true, at first. And then feared it when she realized her heart was not so steady. Not so faithful.
But then, had his been either? He had a mistress, as did Dev—their beloved KGC.
She opened her eyes again and moved into the chamber, letting her fingers trail through the dust on a shelf. His desk, at least, looked clean. Dev wouldn’t want to soil his clothing.
The bottom drawer on the left-hand side of the desk. That was where she had seen them both slipping things when she came to the door. Sometimes they would leave their work out—railroad papers. What, then, did they put away?
The drawer would be locked. She had asked Lucien about that once, early in their marriage, and he had smiled, pulled her onto his knee, and said their company had enemies who weren’t above bribing servants, which was why he kept his important documents locked away.
But it wasn’t company files in that drawer. So then. The key.
She sat in his chair, reaching as she had seen him reach under the desktop. His arm had moved like so…but his was longer. His hands larger, so if she stretched hers out…
Cool metal brushed her fingertips. Clever—a little shelf had been built for it, a thin veneer of wood that the tip of the key hung over. She slid it out and turned it over in her palm as she retracted her arm.
Dusty. Dev must use the other key that Lucien had kept on his ring, the one she had handed over the day of the funeral, knowing most of the keys opened doors at the rail office.
Perfect. She could keep this one to herself. She unlocked the drawer and then took off her necklace, sliding the key down the gold chain until it settled against the cameo.
The clock in the corner hadn’t been wound, so she glanced at the sun outside the window. Still several hours until Dev’s carriage should rumble back over the cobblestones, but she wasn’t about to be caught by surprise like the wolf. She opened the drawer and studied its contents.
Files hung, unlabeled. Ever-organized Lucien would have had everything in a very particular order. And more-organized Devereaux would know exactly what that order was.
He could discover she was in this room, and she could talk her way out of it without any trouble. But if he found her in a locked drawer where he kept sensitive information…that could get dangerous. She would keep things in their proper places, down to that single sheet raised a sixteenth of an inch higher than the others, and the file in the back that looked as though it had been rifled through.
She pulled out the first file, flipped it open, and drew in a deep breath.
She needn’t read anything now. Instead she opted for speed, flipping page after page, glancing at each only a second.
A second was all she needed. Each paper’s image seared itself into her mind’s eye.
One file finished, she moved to the next. Then the next and the next, until she had looked at every sheet within the drawer and had replaced them all. She compared the image before her to the one within her mind of how it had been forty minutes prior. Adjusted the height of this, the angle of that. Then she closed the drawer again and relocked it.
Now what? She could keep poking through the room, but her twitching nerves dissuaded her. She would retire to her own desk, where she usually spent her mornings seeing to correspondence, and examine all she had just found at her leisure.
On her way out, she grabbed a few books from the shelf. She would move them into the main library and claim, if Dev asked, that she had gone in for that express purpose.
Her second-floor drawing room faced east, where morning sunlight filtered through the lightweight curtains and gilded the chamber in gold. She had redone the appointments in pale greens and blues when she moved into the house after her wedding, and now its familiarity wrapped around her. She settled at the delicately carved desk and opened the first letter awaiting her.
But she didn’t read the missive from her aunt. She read instead the first sheet she had looked at in Lucien’s study.
Names. Members of their castle? Assuredly. Lucien’s took the first position, with Captain written beside it—and then crossed out.
The page was filled, front and back, Lucien’s hand mixed with Dev’s. Some of the names she recognized, some were unfamiliar. Some surprising, some not.
And several more crossed out. A few with a note—fell at Shiloh, fell at Carthage, fell at Gettysburg. Many had stars beside them and notes as to which regiments they belonged to.
Northern ones, most of them. Sorrow pinged. This was why the president had made mention of the group being another arm of the military, because they had invaded his own forces and were undermining his troops.
She focused her mental eye upon one of the names. He had died at Gettysburg. And was a member of the V Corp.
Stephen’s corp.
Her brother had likely been fighting side by side with a traitor. Someone who had joined the Union army with the sole purpose of betraying it.
Marietta drew out a fresh sheet of paper, her personal stationery, and her pen and ink. Dear Granddad…
The note was benign, inviting him and Grandmama Gwyn to dine with her on Tuesday. But then she stood and went to the door. After glancing down the hall, she eased it shut and flipped the key in the lock.
She had stashed the invisible ink he had given her with the small vials of perfume she kept in her desk. She often dabbed their sweet scents on her correspondence as an added personal touch. If any of the servants happened across the bottles of straw-colored stain, they would think it her lilac water.
Granddad Thad had shown her how to use it, how to develop it with the counter liquor. He had also pulled out the code book he and her uncles and father and brother used. Flipping through the pages and then putting it away, he had smiled. Because, he’d said, he didn’t have to make another copy and didn’t have to fear it falling into an enemy’s hands.
Finally, a valid use for her perfect recall.
She extracted the vial and a new quill pen from the drawer, and then dipped. Between the lines of the note itself she penned her encoded message, careful to keep the invisible ink from passing over the black, lest it run. She kept it concise, merely explaining what she had found and where, and saying she would put the list of names on the back of the paper. After waiting for it to dry into nothingness, she flipped the page over and got down to work.
Names were difficult to encode, having to do so letter by letter and using a dictionary as key. Granddad had said it was unnecessary in anything she would send him, that the ink itself was insurance enough. So she just wrote. And wrote, until her hand cramped. Each and every name on the list.
Some he no doubt already knew, but some he might not. She crossed out the ones that had been crossed out, starred the ones that had been starred. Wrote until what she assumed was the entire castle filled her page.
While it dried, she unlocked her door. Mother Hughes would likely wonder where she had gotten to this morning, and Dev would be back soon.
She folded the page, put it inside an envelope, and warmed her wax. A glance at her clock told her time was running short. No matter. She would run the message out to Walker in the stable, and then she would go about her day.
Her first action as a spy. A Culper. Maybe eventually it would stop making her sick to her stomach.