39
Jake went to Doc first, who shared his information and suggested Jake talk to Sheriff Jacobson. For not only had the lawman kept Hattie’s rape quiet; he’d maintained his own surveillance on Lord’s house whenever possible.
It was a good lead; the sheriff shared a fat folder of notes. An interesting one was the observation that Lord’s chambermaids changed far more frequently than most—and none had been hired locally from as far back as aught-six, when Jacobson had begun watching the house. Jake had no idea what he anticipated happening when he, too, began keeping an eye on the house. All the same, day after day Jake watched the indoor help as they entered and exited through the back door. Unfortunately, he didn’t see anyone who seemed a likely prospect for what he had in mind.
It wasn’t easy to keep his eye on the house and remain inconspicuous. He’d lived in this town his entire life, and everyone knew his name, business, and antecedents pretty much back to when the earth’s crust cooled. Even so, Jake managed to spend several undetected hours each day viewing the back door. Having found a break in the laurel hedge of a neighboring yard, he slipped in early, sat as still as the cramped position allowed, then slipped out again when the coast was clear. That was a week ago, and he was at his post again, legs pulled to his chest and his chin on his knees, watching the house and doing his best to ignore the moisture seeping into the seat of his Levi’s as he sat on the damp ground. He occupied himself thinking of Hattie.
He needed to find something—anything—else, for thoughts of his wife made him brood. But knowing it and doing something about it were two different matters, and as usual when he was alone, his thoughts turned to her. The light had gone out in her the past ten days. She was like a ghost of her former self. As long as he had known Hattie, the enduring quality that had drawn his fascinated attention time and again—from the day she first came to Mattawa to today—was her exuberance. She was more alive than anyone he’d ever met, more passionate in every respect, whether laughing, raging, or teaching. Her love burned hotter; her hatred was worlds fiercer.
When Jake pictured her at any age, his first image wasn’t her curvy figure, tempting as it was. It was Hattie’s vivid coloring, her expressive face. Jake loved her flushed cheeks and apricot freckles, her mobile rosy lips and white teeth, her golden-brown eyes and that gloriously fiery, untamable hair. He loved her enthusiasms and convictions.
It was as if God said, This child has a zest for life; let it shine like a beacon for all to see. He bestowed that face upon her as a badge of her spirit, and her true nature simply could not be disguised—even when she returned to Mattawa a quieter, more mature edition of herself. She might be able to camouflage her passion with some success, but she sure as hell couldn’t bury it entirely. It had cropped up again and again, with her students, with their parents, and with a hundred and one enthusiasms she couldn’t control. Her spirit never diminished. Until now.
Jake dug his chin into his kneecap. Her cheeks were pale these days, her head bowed. He’d been avoiding her, but he had been around enough to recognize that when he looked at her, all he saw was the top of her head. The life seemed to have seeped out of her that night in the stable when the identity of her rapist exploded in his consciousness—and only now did he think to wonder if his wife’s apathy might be rooted in something besides a bitter distaste for him.
For the first time since realizing what he’d done, it occurred to Jake to wonder why the hell she had married him in the first place. Why she’d made love to him with unbridled responsiveness. Yeah, she’d been practically dragged to the altar. But on their wedding night, despite fearing an act he’d mandated in his arrogance would be part of their lives, Hattie had let him love her without a struggle. And, oh God, her response nearly drove him to his knees. She hadn’t acted like she hated him that night—or any since then.
Her behavior had been as generous and giving as that of a woman in love.
A sudden, desperate need to talk to her exploded in his mind. Why hadn’t he talked to her? Jake slowly straightened his legs, grimacing at the stiffness in his knees. He couldn’t see past his own agonized guilt once he discovered what he’d done by sending her to Roger. Yet, what he’d just discovered, Hattie had known all along. And she’d married him anyway.
Oh, hell, yeah. They definitely needed to talk.
He was inching out of his cramped cave in the hedge when the back door opened and a young woman stepped out. Jake pulled his legs back in, waiting for her to pass. He glanced at her without interest, anxious to get home to his wife. Then his gaze sharpened and he froze.
Good God Almighty. She was a pale imitation of Hattie. Her body wasn’t as lush, her hair not as brilliantly red. But there was something reminiscent of his wife. And Jake knew.
This was it. What he’d been looking for. Jake eased out of the laurel. Casting a swift look around, he winged a quick prayer to pass unobserved as he edged along the perimeter of Lord’s yard. He fell into step behind the woman, keeping half a block between them. Two blocks from the house, he began to shorten the distance.
When he touched her arm, she jumped and dropped her basket. She whirled to face him, one pale hand, framed by a stark white cuff, flying to the matching collar on her black dress. “Oh, sir! You frightened me.”
“I’m sorry,” he said softly. He leaned down and retrieved her basket, offering it to her. Then he hesitated, unsure how to proceed, and the young woman’s pale blue eyes narrowed warily. In their depths, Jake saw a frail vestige of a feistiness that perhaps hadn’t yet been entirely beaten out of the young woman. Encouraged, he said with the utmost gentleness, “I know what Roger Lord is doing to you.”
Eyes filling with horror, she backed away. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Yes, you do. I want to help.”
“You cannot.” She began to walk once again.
“Yes,” he replied gently to her stiff profile as he fell into step beside her, “I can. With your help, I can put the man behind bars where he belongs. Where he can never harm you again.”
She stopped walking and turned to face him. “How?”
“By charging him with rape.”
Her tear-filled eyes grew enormous. “Are you insane?” she whispered. “I’d be ruined.”
“Is that worse than allowing him to continue doing what he’s doing to you?” he snapped impatiently . . . then touched her arm in contrition. “I’m sorry,” he said. “That was unfair. Of course, it’s a valid concern. Do you have a family?”
“No.”
“More than anything I wish I could promise it would be easy,” he said slowly. “But I can’t. You would have to press charges and that means a trial. The defense will try to make you look like a harlot in order to save Lord’s worthless hide. But it seems to me nothing can be as painful as what he’s getting away with now. And one thing I can promise you is a place with a good family in Seattle or San Francisco afterward. Somewhere where no one will ever have to know a thing about you.” He looked down at her in silence for several moments while she appeared to think over his proposal. “Please,” he finally said. “Help me lock this sick bastard away. I guarantee you can then move on to a good position.”
She glanced up and down the quiet street. She shifted the basket from her right arm to her left, then straightened her cuffs. She looked down at the dust coating her serviceable shoes. Then raised her eyes to Jake. And whispered, “What do I have to do?”
Her name was Opal Jeffries and she was nineteen years old. She had been in service for three years as a parlormaid, and until her employment with Roger Lord began three weeks ago, she’d never minded the work, for it was the only life she’d ever known.
Jake asked her how she had come to be in Lord’s employ.
“He hired me away from the Conleys after coming to dinner one night. He seemed like such a gentleman and he offered better wages than I ever got,” she explained. “I had no idea how wicked-mean he could be.”
“I know this is painful, Opal,” Jake said gently, looking at her across the scarred desk in Sheriff Jacobson’s office. “But I need to ask. Were you a virgin when you began your employment with Lord?”
“Yes, sir!” she replied in red-faced indignation. “That was the other reason I accepted his offer, because of the Conleys’ son, Adam. When he came home from college this summer he began cornering me in the upstairs hallway, makin’ improper suggestions. Tryin’ to play fast and loose with my virtue.” Her chin tilted up proudly. “I’m a good girl, Mr. Murdock, Sheriff Jacobson. I thought Mr. Lord’s offer was the perfect solution to my problem.” Her bark of laughter held no amusement, for the irony was not lost on anyone in Jacobson’s cramped office.
The next half hour was extremely painful. Topics of a sexual nature were never discussed between men and any woman with the least bit of breeding—and spinsters in particular were protected from the baser facts of life. But given the nature of the crime they planned to charge Lord with, it was imperative the men ask Opal questions so excruciatingly intimate that all three of them were either red as autumn leaves or pale as death by the end of the interview.
“What do you think?” Sheriff Jacobson asked Jake at its conclusion. “Y’have enough to convict him?”
“I hope so.” Jake raked his hand through his hair. “You’re articulate,” he said to Opal. “I feel you’ll make a very convincing witness. Cases of this nature are rare, though, and with the defense trying to make you look bad in the eyes of all-male jurors, they can be tricky.” He reached across the table and patted her hand. “I’m not trying to minimize what Lord’s done to you, but a bloodstained sheet or photographs of bruises would help our case. Catching him in the act is the only sure guarantee of a conviction, but I will do my utmost to put him away. With those odds, are you still willing to press charges?”
For several silent moments, Opal stared down at her lap, where her knuckles stood white from the death grip she had on her tightly interlaced fingers. But when she looked up, determination burned in the depths of her pale-blue eyes. “What if we caught him in the act?”
Sheriff Jacobson regarded her with intense interest, but Jake was appalled. “What?”
“What if I went back there? You don’t understand how arrogant he is, Mr. Murdock. If I locked myself in my room and refused to go to him, he would be furious. He thinks it’s his God-given right to hurt me. I don’t know how many times I heard him say”—she gagged suddenly, then recovered herself—“‘This’ll teach you your rightful place.’” There was a sudden harshness in her voice, which just for an instant reflected the viciousness of her attacker.
“Stop right there,” Jake said. “It’s too dangerous. God knows how many people saw you with me today or saw the two of us come in here.”
“It doesn’t matter, Mr. Murdock. He truly believes he’s above the law. If I refused to come out of my room, he would likely break the door down and do whatever he wanted to do.”
“No,” Jake said with flat finality.
“Hold on there a second, son,” Sheriff Jacobson interrupted, straightening in his wooden chair. “Miss Jeffries has a point. If we rig up a simple alarm, we could be in her room before he has a chance to hurt her. Cans on a string, tied to the bedpost and lowered out the window, would do the trick. One tug and we’d hear the clatter.”
“Yeah? And what if he gets to her before she ever gets to her room? What if he’s waiting for her at the kitchen door, demanding why she was seen talking to me?”
Opal looked at him as if he were crazy. “Oh no, sir, he would never do that—not for any reason. He’s much too high-and-mighty to ever be caught dead in a servants’ space.”
“Then he won’t come to your room either.”
“That’s different, sir. To have me refuse his demand—” She hitched a shoulder. “It will drive him mad.”
“He’s already insane. That’s exactly what scares me,” Jake said glumly.
But no matter what his objections, Opal Jeffries was determined to go through with her plan. “I will not put myself through the shame of a public trial if at the end of it there is only the smallest chance he’ll be put away,” she said adamantly. “Please, Mr. Murdock. I want to be certain-sure the bastard goes to jail. I want him to be ruined. Just like he ruined me.”
Leaving Opal describing to the sheriff the location of her room in relation to the rest of the floor plan in Roger’s house, Jake went down the street to Norton’s Mercantile. He purchased two cow bells and a ball of sturdy twine and, once back in the jailhouse, fashioned a crude alarm with them and placed it in the bottom of Opal’s basket. They covered it with a linen napkin from Jacobson’s lunch tray and Opal left to make the purchases she’d been sent to town to acquire.
Jake retrieved his automobile and drove it to the avenue two streets behind Lord’s residence. Parking on a cross street, he strode a block north, then cut through three backyards to reach his post in the laurel hedge.
Opal arrived a short while later, unobtrusively tailed by the sheriff. She disappeared through the back door, and Jacobson found himself a spot where he, too, could observe the back of the residence. A short while after she entered the house, they saw an attic window slide open. Opal’s face appeared momentarily in the opening and then the cowbells were slowly lowered. They tinkled faintly as she played out the twine, but after a few moments they stilled. The window was lowered until it was nearly shut. Then, the only thing they could do was wait.
Jake and the sheriff knew they might have to wait hours, for Opal warned them that Lord only called for her in the evening. Yet Jake hadn’t fully understood just how slowly time could stretch in a situation like this. Shadows crept across the length of the yard, and the summer heat gave way to cool twilight.
It felt like it had been dark for hours when Jake started finding it difficult keeping his eyes open. He willed himself to stay alert, but time and again he dozed off, only to jerk awake when his chin touched his chest. Time crawled with a pace that made garden snails look like speed demons. And checking his timepiece every few minutes, he learned, didn’t help.
Suddenly the bells began to clamor, wrenching Jake out of his doze. He scrambled out of the hedge and tried to stand, but his knees buckled from maintaining the same posture for several hours. Dragging himself to his feet, he hobbled toward the back door as fast as he could. Sheriff Jacobson was there before him.
Both men were prepared to kick the door in but discovered it wasn’t necessary; the portal swung open when Sheriff Jacobson turned the handle. The cook, sitting at the table with her hands over her ears, gaped at the two men barreling through the door. No one said a word as Jake and the sheriff raced up the back stairs.
Even without the directions Opal had given them, they would’ve handily located her room. She was screaming at the top of her lungs and they followed the sound. They came to an opened door splintered off its hinges, just as she had predicted, and burst into the room.
For an instant, Jake thought they were too late. Opal was on her back on the bed, her face marked where Lord had obviously struck her. The top of her dress hung in tatters, its skirt thrown up to her waist. Then he saw that although Lord’s pants pooled around his ankles, Opal was fighting like a wildcat and Lord had yet to complete his attack.
Sheriff Jacobson reached the bed first. Wrapping a beefy arm around Roger Lord’s neck, he hauled him roughly off Opal’s body. “Pull your pants up, you sick sonovabitch,” he bit out. “You’re under arrest.”
Jake crossed to Opal. “Are you all right?”
“Yes,” she said shakily. Then burst into tears.
He wrapped her in the bedspread and stroked her hair until she calmed. “It’s all right now,” he murmured. “It’s all over. Because of your bravery that vermin will never hurt you or another woman again.”
Sheriff Jacobson prepared to lead his prisoner from the room, but Jake requested that he wait for just one moment. As soon as Opal calmed, he stood and crossed to stand in front of Lord.
Roger returned his contemptuous look with a supercilious stare of his own . . . until the sheriff casually averted his head and Jake abruptly jerked his knee up, ramming it into Lord’s crotch. Roger’s expression then went from superior to sick as he sagged in the sheriff’s grasp, retching and gagging. Jacobson stared out the window, whistling softly.
“I’ll take Opal to my mother,” Jake murmured. Jacobson nodded and led his stumbling prisoner away. Instructing Opal to change and pack, Jake then went to find a telephone. Central connected him with his party, and Doc answered on the second ring.
Swiftly, Jake asked him to meet him at his mother’s house with his camera and his black bag, promising he’d explain the situation in full at that time. Then he hung up, collected Opal, and drove her to Augusta’s.
It was late by the time he drove up the ranch road after much explaining, then seeing Opal settled at his mother’s. Yet Jake felt optimistic for the first time in more than two weeks. He was convinced Lord would ultimately get what he deserved. Then maybe all their lives could get back to normal. He was anxious to talk to Hattie.
The house was dark when he let himself in. Racing up the stairs two at a time, Jake burst into their bedroom. He skidded to a halt just inside the door. The room was empty, his wife not there as he’d expected. Where the hell could she be at this time of night? Feeling a creeping unease, he glanced over at the open closet doors as he started to back out of the room. And their significance slowly sank in.
Every one of Hattie’s hangers was empty.