“What are you doing?” I whisper, my eyes adjusting to the low light. There are gas lamps on the walls but they ain’t lit, and even though a bit of light filters in through the windows, it is too dark to see anything other than the vague outline of bookshelves and a massive square that I take to be a desk.
“I need your help,” Jackson says, striking a match and lighting a kerosene lantern. “I’m supposed to be in the cellar bringing up a couple of bottles of port for the men, but I saw you duck out and figured you were looking for evidence of where Lily is.”
“Please. I was trying to use the water closet. Now if you’ll excuse me.” Even if I am looking for answers, Red Jack is only going to get me caught. I make to leave but he grabs my arm. “Jackson—”
“Jane, you know I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t have to.” I cross my arms and he sighs. “I know things ended badly between us, and you’ve always been more accommodating than I got any right to expect, but you know I can’t read a damn word of the files the mayor’s got in here. I don’t know what’s the household accounting and what might be dastardly. So, I’m asking you, with a whole heap of consideration I don’t deserve: Will you please help me?”
The lamplight plays across Jackson’s features, but somehow I don’t think he’s acting. If he’s desperate enough to mention our falling-out, then I know he’s worried something fierce.
Even so, nowhere in that speech did I hear an apology.
“I just want you to know that I’m doing this for Lily, not you. As far as I’m concerned, you can rot in hell.” Relief relaxes his features and he nods. I purse my lips, taking in the desk and accompanying drawers. “Here, hold the light so I can see.”
The mayor’s desk is well organized, and there are enough cost sheets and file folders that my head spins. I open the drawers beside the desk, but there’s nothing unusual, just the normal ledger keeping and invoices you’d expect for a tobacco farm.
I try to pull out the bottom drawer and it refuses to budge. I wave Jackson over and point to the drawer. “Can you get it open?”
He sets the lantern on the desk. “You got a hairpin?”
I touch my hair and pull one out, thankful when the weight and mass of my hair stays put. Jackson starts to work on the lock, glancing up at me, his expression nearly unreadable in the dark. “You look real pretty tonight.”
I don’t say anything, my heart thumping in my chest. Never once did Jackson ever tell me I was pretty before things went bad. I think he always took me for granted. Even when I was throwing bottles at his head and telling him what a louse he was he still seemed surprised, as though he never thought I’d get mad enough to tell him things between us were over.
“That getup really does something for you, Janey-Jane. I can see why you take your training and all that so serious. You belong to this life. You’ll be a brilliant Attendant.”
The drawer pops open, saving me from having to answer him. Jackson reaches in and pulls out a thick ledger book.
“Look,” I say, tapping the front. SUMMERLAND is written there in gold embossed letters. “What’s ‘Summerland’?”
“I have no idea.”
I open the book, but before I get very far there’s the unmistakable sound of a gun cocking. “Summerland is a town in Kansas. Nice place, bit of a work in progress, like most frontier towns. And I get the feeling you’re going to get to see it firsthand.”
The room brightens, Miss Anderson lighting a gas lamp on the wall, a macabre grin on her face. The light reveals Mr. Redfern in the doorway, a nice pair of six-shooters leveled at me and Jackson.
“Miss McKeene, Red Jack,” he says, drawing room–polite. “I do believe the mayor is expecting you.”
I must apologize: this letter has gotten much longer than I expected it to be. Please give the aunties my love, and tell Auntie Eliza that I’m expecting a pecan pie when I return! I love you, Momma, more than anything on earth or in the Lord’s heavens above. Please stay safe. I shall be home soon.
Chapter 15In Which My Fate Is Decided
Miss Anderson strips me of my weapons before she claps me and Red Jack in irons and leads us down a back staircase to a lower part of the house. Jackson’s face is impassive, and I try to mimic his calm demeanor. I’m afraid I fail miserably. My stomach is all angry butterflies and nerves, and I feel like I’m going to lose what little control I have at any moment. I also still need to empty my bladder, which is not helping the situation at all.
I’ve been in trouble before, but somehow the gun pointed at my back and the heavy irons on my wrists make me think that this is much worse than stealing a pie from the kitchens.
The staircase is steep, and just when I wonder if it will ever end we enter a long corridor lit by gas lamps. The flames flicker, making the deep shadows on the stone walls dance drunkenly. From down the hallway comes a long, low howl. The hair along my arms stands on end, and Miss Anderson gives me a wide grin.
“You hear them, don’t you?” she says.
“The mayor keeps shamblers?”
“Of course not. Don’t be ridiculous. That’s his dogs. The kennels are at the end of this corridor. You’re even stupider than I thought,” she says with a sneer.
I’m beginning to think she truly doesn’t care for me.
Miss Anderson stops and knocks on a fancy door carved to depict Adam and Eve fleeing the Garden. The angel casting them out looks a mite bit like the mayor.
That does not help my nervousness
