Saturday, April 13, 8:30 p.m.
The room fell silent.
“Fort Sumter fell at 2:34 this afternoon, after thirty-four hours of fighting,” Miss Averill announced, loudly enough so all could hear.
“How many killed?” someone called from the back of the room.
She shook her head. “No one on either side.”
Nell was still standing a few feet away from the door, and was about to speak when her uncle pushed her toward the door. He turned back to the stunned crowd.
“If your questions were not answered tonight, you can blame the impertinent idiot who had the audacity to question my loyalty to my niece. She will only be available for private consultations during the next week.”
But by that time no one was paying attention to him.
Fort Sumter had fallen. The Confederates had won. The ballroom filled with noisy conversations as people stood and put on their wraps. The headline wrote itself inside my head: FORT SUMTER LOST.
“How awful—how insulting to Miss Gramercy, that someone asked her that question,” I heard one man say. His voice seemed very far away.
“That was the shortest evening’s entertainment I’ve ever paid for. And for twenty-five cents,” complained another.
“She would have stopped anyway after Miss Averill came in. Fort Sumter’s fallen. We’re at war now.”
“What’s Lincoln going to do?”
“Guess Captain Tucker, and anyone else with business in the South, just lost their incomes,” said another man. “Buy you an ale at the tavern?”
“You will not,” interrupted a woman’s voice. “I’m taking my husband home. If President Lincoln starts calling up troops, who knows what will happen. I want my Henry to be home as long as possible.”
“What wonderful things Miss Gramercy knew,” said another woman nearby. “I must register for one of her private sessions. Who knows what messages she might have for me?”
War. That was all I could focus on. I moved through the crowd toward the door, passing two women congratulating Mr. and Mrs. Bascomb on the impending birth of their child. Normally such an event would not be spoken of until the possibility of a child being born was clearly visible, but Mrs. Bascomb was blushing and nodding. Nell must have been right, although it would be months before anyone would know if her prediction of another brother for Owen was correct.
Charlie came up behind me. “What a night! Nell Gramercy answering questions like that, and Fort Sumter falling! I only wish she’d been able to answer more questions, so we’d have had more time to figure out what she was doing. Who do you think asked such a brazen last question?”
Not waiting for an answer, Charlie led the way to his small room, where he began pacing from one side to the other. “When will they start signing men up to fight?” he wondered out loud. “What will happen to the soldiers captured in Charleston? What will President Lincoln do? Where will the next battle be?”
“Hold on, Charlie!” If Charlie got all churned up, he’d be of no use to me—and I needed his help. “We got this week’s issue of the Herald out just in time. No one will fault us for not including the results of the battle. But now we have to write up another special edition, get it out tomorrow if we can.”
“You can count on me,” said Charlie, finally sitting down. “We’ll want it out before we do the interview with Nell Gramercy on Monday. Which reminds me: I wonder who asked her that last question?”
“I did,” I told him.
“What?”
“I asked her the question about her uncle that made him so angry.”
“But why? Why did you ask her that in public?” asked Charlie. “We’re going to talk to her Monday. Now her uncle knows someone thinks he’s running her life.”
“Well, he is,” I said. “But, more important, you want to prove she’s a fraud. How can we do that without evidence? She spoke for such a short time tonight. We didn’t find out anything. Although she did say that she’d talked with some of the people in the room before; maybe she’d already met the people whose questions she answered. If so, she’d have known their concerns.”
“Who was that first man whose question she answered—the one with the beard?” asked Charlie.
I shook my head. “I’ve never seen him before. He said he was headin’ to Belfast. Few people are traveling by road this time of year.”
“And he said he’d be going tomorrow. There’s only one way he could do that and not be delayed by the mud.” Charlie looked at me.
I nodded in agreement. “By water.”
Without saying another word we left the Mansion House and headed down to the north end of Water Street. We passed groups of men talking about the defeat at Fort Sumter.
There was no sign of the bearded man from Belfast. “He’s probably at one of the taverns,” Charlie said. “If he’s a fisherman or a mariner, he’ll no doubt be at Bailey’s. That’s the one closest to the wharves.”
We both hesitated. Neither of us wanted to admit it, but our parents would be furious if they heard we’d gone into the disreputable public house owned by Major Ben Bailey. Maine, of course, is a dry state. Whiskey can’t be sold except for medicinal purposes, by doctors or pharmacists. Folks order it shipped from Massachusetts for personal imbibing.
Other taverns in town respected the law by having men bring their own liquor in and “renting” glasses, or by selling food and “giving” whiskey away with meals. Not Major Bailey. His customers were mostly visiting mariners and those that were down and out. He sold whiskey openly. Sheriff Chadbourne closed him down now and again, but Pa’d told me that most upright Wiscasset folks liked the way things were. Bailey’s Tavern kept rough and rowdy mariners down on the north end of Water Street, away from the rest of town. The gentlemen and ladies who lived up on High Street liked it that way.
“We’re newsmen,” said Charlie defiantly. “We need to interview that man from Belfast.”
I was younger than Charlie. I couldn’t show him I was more than a little afraid of this place. When we reached Bailey’s Tavern, I pushed open the door.
The inside of the low-ceilinged room was dark with tobacco smoke and stank of whiskey and rum and hard-living men. Some stopped their conversations to look at us curiously.
“Up past your bedtime?” jibed one mariner with a wide red scar on his left cheek.
“Does your mother know where you are?” asked another, raising his tankard in our direction.
“We’re seeking a man headed to Belfast,” I said, raising my voice above the din. “Has a full, dark beard, and was up to the Mansion House an hour or so ago.”
“What’re you wanting with him?” answered a deep voice from the corner.
I turned. It was the man we’d been looking for. We made our way through the crowd, who’d quieted down to hear what we had to say.
“Could we talk with you for a few moments?” asked Charlie. “It’s about Nell Gramercy.”
“Lovely young lady she is, indeed,” said the man. “And her uncle, a real gentleman. Supplied us all with rum this night, he did.”
Charlie and I looked at each other.
“What do you mean, supplied you all with rum?” I asked.
“Earlier this week I was down to the wharves, checking my vessel, like any mariner would in this weather, when that citified Allen fellow came up to me. He inquired whether I knew many folks in town. I told him, no, I hailed from Belfast, but was tied up here due to business concerns. So he asked if I’d like to be making some hard cash. I said I was willing. He said I wasn’t to tell anyone. But the money’s been exchanged and drunk by now, so what’s he to do?”
“What did he pay you for?”
“He gave me this fancy ring,” the sailor said, taking the velvet sack out of his pocket and showing the boys the ring within. Up close they could see it wasn’t real—only gold-painted tin.
“He told me as how his niece wanted to impress folks in town, so he asked me to get all excited, like, about what she said, and pretend it was a message from my mum.” He grinned. “Paid me ahead of time, and it worked real well, I’d say. Always had a taste for the stage, I have. And I was back here at Bailey’s by quarter past the hour.”
He stood up and staggered a few steps toward the boys. “That answer your questions, young fellows?”
“Yes,” I said. “Thank you.”
“If you’d like, you could buy me another drink, you know. To thank me real good. Allen’s money disappeared faster than I planned.”
“We don’t have any money,” said Charlie, backing toward the door but taking out his notebook. “What’s your name? We write for the local newspaper, and we’d like to use you as a source.”
“Name’s Daniel Obadiah Jacobs,” said the man, breathing heavy fumes in our direction. “And ‘Esquire’ would look real good in print, too.”
“Thank you again,” I said as we rushed out the door and back onto Water Street, the laughter of the men inside following us.
We’d run a few steps down Water Street and were on Main before Charlie spoke.
“That’s our proof, Joe—proof that Nell’s performance this evening was staged.”
I had to agree.
“At least the first part of it was. You were right; her uncle planned it.” I hated to think Nell had lied to me. “And maybe she’d met with those other people earlier, and could guess what they’d be asking, too. But how did she know what folded question she’d pick next? And how did she know what I asked?”