He shook his head. It was true: Kathleen’s brothel, or Miss Dugan’s as it was known, was one of the most high-end, discreet establishments in town. If a working girl didn’t like the look of her client, or heaven forbid if he behaved badly, that man was unceremoniously ushered out by Augustus’s large and capable hands.
“Girls want to work here,” Kathleen continued proudly. “They know they’ll be well fed, well paid, and not forced to do anything they don’t like. I’ve built something good here, Danny. And the men are clamoring for more—we have to turn them away.”
Daniel sighed. He’d studied different theories of economics at Harvard and didn’t want to argue with his cousin that the young women in her employ typically came from such impoverished circumstances that of course Miss Dugan’s seemed a luxurious option, but what would truly be luxurious would be other options: higher education and a job that didn’t involve selling their bodies.
He rubbed his jaw. She wouldn’t understand. Kathleen simply saw the larger social system in place, not how it needed to change. He was partially to blame, having loaned her the money to start the business in the first place. Daniel had been away at school when she arrived from Ireland, and when she showed up on his doorstep nearly three years later, destitute but asking for a loan instead of charity, he’d been so thrilled to find a relation that he’d have signed over his entire fortune if she’d asked.
As far as he knew, she was the only family he had left.
Daniel irritably stared out the window again. He knew he could probably disguise himself, as Genevieve had, and with the cover of night, give her the slip again. But she’d proved damn tenacious, and even if he eluded her now, she’d just pop up again like a jack-in-the-box sometime in the coming days.
No, best to get this over with, he told himself. If she wanted to talk, then fine, they could talk. It was probably the only way to get her out of his hair.
He settled into the magnificent meal Kathleen had presented. If she was still there by the time he finished, Genevieve Stewart was going to get an earful.
Genevieve shifted again in the seat of the wooden chair she’d been occupying for hours, trying to alleviate the ache that had developed in her tailbone. It was a perfectly ordinary café chair, but she’d never noticed before how devilishly hard they were. Probably because she’d never sat in one for so long.
She stared moodily at the lukewarm cup of tea in front of her. She’d drunk countless cups during this vigil and wasn’t sure she could stomach another sip. Over the course of several hours she’d also consumed a bowl of oyster chowder and a satisfying plate of hot gingerbread, but now her stomach was starting to rumble restlessly from hunger again, adding to her discomfort.
Genevieve sighed and checked her timepiece. Should she order another meal? Or admit that her attempt to learn something useful about Daniel McCaffrey had been a failure and leave?
She glanced out the window at the establishment across the street, undecided. The discreet red light by the door had informed her instantly of the unassuming townhouse’s function. Seeing Daniel walk into such a place had caused swift and unexpected disappointment, but she had found this café and settled in to await his departure, ready to resume the chase whenever he left. It was her first attempt to follow him, an effort she planned to continue until she learned something of note. Something about Robin Hood, or the dead man in the alley.
Something that settled the nagging, persistent suspicion that Daniel McCaffrey knew more than he was saying.
Something of greater interest than the fact that he apparently spent hours in a brothel upon occasion.
Genevieve tapped her pencil against the table, pondering, and consulted her notebook for what felt like the thousandth time, weighing the known facts against what was unknown.
On one side of an open page, she had listed what she knew: Robin Hood had begun his rash of thefts six weeks prior. Or at least his known thefts, the ones for which he had claimed responsibility in his letters to the Globe. Three families had been struck thus far: Winston and Bitsy Collins, Mrs. Pauline Jones, and now Andrew and Sarah Huffington. In all three cases, jewelry had been taken.
According to ship passenger manifests in the newspaper’s archives, Daniel had arrived in New York on Friday, November eighteenth.
The thefts had begun in early January.
Winston and Bitsy Collins had given a dinner party the first week of 1888 to celebrate the New Year, and the exclusive guest list, Genevieve had learned, included Caroline Schermerhorn Astor, Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton Fish, Mrs. Pauline Jones, and Daniel McCaffrey, among others. As far as she had been able to glean, both Bitsy Collins and Pauline Jones were wearing the jewels that night that would later be stolen: Bitsy a three-strand pearl choker necklace with a vast diamond at its center, surrounded by small emeralds, and the widowed Mrs. Jones a diamond bracelet containing a sapphire nearly the size of a robin’s egg.
The necklace had gone missing the night following the dinner party, the bracelet almost three weeks later. Mrs. Jones had not worn the bracelet since the Collinses’ dinner party, nor had she entertained at her own home in the duration.
Sarah and Andrew Huffington had not been invited to the dinner party.
Indeed, Genevieve was a little puzzled as to why Daniel had been included, as the guest list otherwise had been made up of a very particular elite crowd. Perhaps because Winston Collins and Jacob Van Joost had been friends?
Genevieve gazed meditatively at a passerby on the street, bundled against the dropping temperatures. The café was busier now, and she decided to wait a few more minutes before placing another order.
Sarah Huffington’s ring had been stolen the very night
