The Dead Letter · Part I · Chapter 1 4 (1/2)

IV

Moreland Villa

Several minor circumstances prevented my going in search of the woman who had excited my suspicions on the previous day, until about nine o’clock of the morning, when I engaged an officer, and we two went quietly, without communicating our plans to anyone else, to the tenement-house before spoken of.

Although Blankville was not a large village, there was in it, as in nearly every town blessed with a railroad depot, a shabby quarter where the rougher portion of its working people lived. The house stood in this quarter⁠—it was a three-story frame building, occupied by half a dozen families, mostly those of Irish laborers, who found work in the vicinity of the depot. I had seen the strange girl ascend to the second floor, in the dim light of the previous night, so we went up and knocked at the first door we came upon. It was opened by a decent-appearing middle-aged woman, who held the knob in her hand while she waited for us to make known our errand; we both stepped into her apartment, before we spoke. A rapid glance revealed an innocent-looking room with the ordinary furniture of such a place⁠—a cooking-stove, bed, table, etc.; but no other inmate. There was a cupboard, the door of which stood open, showing its humble array of dishes and eatables⁠—there were no pantries, nor other places of concealment. I was certain that I had seen the girl enter this room at the head of the stairs, so I ventured:

“Is your daughter at home, ma’am?”

“Is it my niece you mean?”

I detected an Irish accent, though the woman spoke with but little “brogue,” and was evidently an old resident of our country⁠—in a manner Americanized.

“Oh, she is your niece? I suppose so⁠—a tall girl with dark eyes and hair.”

“That’s Leesy, herself. Was you wanting any work done?”

“Yes,” answered the officer, quickly, taking the matter out of my hands. “I wanted to get a set of shirts made up⁠—six, with fine, stitched bosoms.” He had noticed a cheap sewing-machine standing near the window, and a bundle of coarse muslin in a basket near by.

“It’s sorry I am to disappoint you; but Leesy’s not with me now, and I hardly venture on the fine work. I make the shirts for the hands about the railroad that hasn’t wives of their own to do it⁠—but for the fine bussums”⁠—doubtfully⁠—“though, to be sure, the machine does the stitches up beautiful⁠—if it wasn’t for the buttonholes!”

“Where is Leesy? Doesn’t she stop with you?”

“It’s her I have here always when she’s out of a place. She’s an orphan, poor girl, and it’s not in the blood of a Sullivan to turn off their own. I’ve brought her up from a little thing of five years old⁠—given her the education, too. She can read and write like the ladies of the land.”

“You didn’t say where she was, Mrs. Sullivan.”

“She’s making the fine things in a fancy-store in New York⁠—caps and collars and sleeves and the beautiful tucked waists⁠—she’s such taste, and the work is not so hard as plain-sewing⁠—four dollars a week she gets, and boarded for two and a half, in a nice, genteel place. She expects to be illivated to the forewoman’s place, at seven dollars the week, before many months. She was here to stay over the Sunday with me⁠—she often does that; and she’s gone back by the six o’clock train this mornin’⁠—and she’ll be surely late at that by an hour. I tried to coax her to stay the day, she seemed so poorly. She’s not been herself this long time⁠—she seems goin’ in a decline like⁠—it’s the stooping over the needle, I think. She’s so nervous-like, the news of the murder yesterday almost killed her. ’Twas an awful deed that, wasn’t it, gintlemen? I couldn’t sleep a wink last night for thinkin’ of that poor young man and the sweet lady he was to have married. Such a fine, generous, polite young gintleman!”

“Did you know him?”

“Know him! as well as my own son if I had one!⁠—not that ever I spoke to him, but he’s passed here often on his way to his father’s house, and to Mr. Argyll’s; and Leesy sewed in their family these two summers when they’ve been here, and was always twice paid. When she’d go away he’d say, laughing in his beautiful way, ‘And how much have you earned a day, Miss Sullivan, sitting there all these long, hot hours?’ and she’d answer, ‘Fifty cents a day, and thanks to your mother for the good pay;’ and he’d put his hand in his pocket and pull out a ten-dollar gold-piece and say, ‘Women aren’t half paid for their work! it’s a shame! if you hain’t earned a dollar a day, Miss Sullivan, you hain’t earned a cent. So don’t be afraid to take it⁠—it’s your due.’ And that’s what made Leesy think so much of him⁠—he was so thoughtful of the poor⁠—God bless him! How could anybody have the heart to do it!”

I looked at the officer and found his eyes reading my face. One thought had evidently flashed over both of us; but it was a suspicion which wronged the immaculate memory of Henry Moreland, and I, for my part, banished it as soon as it entered my mind. It was like him to pay generously the labors of a sickly sewing-girl; it was not like him to take any advantage of her ignorance or gratitude, which might result in her taking such desperate revenge for her wrongs. The thought was an insult to him and to the noble woman who was to have been his wife. I blushed at the intrusive, unwelcome fancy; but the officer, not knowing the deceased as I knew him, and, perhaps, having no such exalted idea of manhood as mine, seemed to feel as if here might be a thread to follow.

“Leesy thought much of him, you think, Mrs. Sullivan,” taking a chair unbidden, and putting on a friendly, gossiping air. “Everybody speaks well of him. So she sewed in the family?”

“Six weeks every summer. They was always satisfied with her sewing⁠—she’s the quickest and neatest hand with the needle! She’d make them shirts of yours beautiful, if she was to home, sir.”

“When did she go to New York to live?”

“Last winter, early. It’s nearly a year now. There was something come across her⁠—she appeared homesick like, and strange. When she said she meant to go to the city and get work, I was minded to let her go, for I thought the change mebbe would do her good. But she’s quite ailing and coughs dreadful o’ nights. I’m afraid she catched cold in that rainstorm night afore last; she came up all the way from the depot in it. She was wet to the skin when she got here and as white as a sheet. She was so weak-like that when the neighbors came in with the news yesterday, she gave a scream and dropped right down. I didn’t wonder she was took aback. I ain’t got done trembling yet myself.”

I remembered the gentleman who had first spoken to me about the girl said that she had come in on the morning train Saturday; I could not reconcile this with her coming up from the depot at dark; yet I wished to put my question in such a way as not to arouse suspicion of my motive.

“If she came in the six o’clock train she must have been on the same train with Mr. Moreland.”

“I believe she was in the seven o’clock cars⁠—yes, she was. ’Twas half-past seven when she got in⁠—the rain was pouring down awful. She didn’t see him, for I asked her yesterday.”

“In whose shop in New York is she employed?” inquired the officer.

“She’s at No 3‒ Broadway,” naming a store somewhere between Wall Street and Canal.

“Are you wanting her for anything?” she asked, suddenly, looking up sharply as if it just occurred to her that our inquiries were rather pointed.

“Oh, no,” replied my companion, rising; “I was a bit tired, and thought I’d rest my feet before starting out again. I’ll thank you for a glass of water, Mrs. Sullivan. So you won’t undertake the shirts?”

“If I thought I could do the buttonholes⁠—”

“Perhaps your niece could do them on her next visit, if you wanted the job,” I suggested.

“Why, so she could! and would be glad to do something for her old aunt. It’s bright you are to put me in mind of it. Shall I come for the work, sir?”

“I’ll send it round when I get it ready. I suppose your niece intends to visit you next Saturday?”

“Well, ra’ly, I can’t say. It’s too expensive her coming every week; but, she’ll sure be here afore the whole six is complate. Good-mornin’, gintlemen⁠—and they’s heard nothin’ of the murderer, I’ll warrant?”

We responded that nothing had been learned, and descending to the street, it was arranged, as we walked along, that the officer should go to New York and put some detective there on the track of Leesy Sullivan. I informed my companion of the discrepancy between her actual arrival in town and her appearance at her aunt’s. Either the woman had purposely deceived us, or her niece had not gone home for a good many hours after landing at Blankville. I went with him to the depot, where we made a few inquiries which convinced us that she had arrived on Saturday morning, and sat an hour or two in the ladies’ room, and then gone away up town.

There was sufficient to justify our looking further. I took from my own pocket means to defray the expenses of the officer as well as to interest the New York detective, adding that liberal rewards were about to be offered, and waited until I saw him depart on his errand.

Then, turning to go to the office, my heart so sickened at the idea of business and the ordinary routine of living in the midst of such misery, that my footsteps shrunk away from their familiar paths! I could do nothing, just then, for the aid or comfort of the afflicted. The body was to be taken that afternoon to the city for interment, the next day, in the family enclosure at Greenwood; until the hour for its removal, there was nothing more that friendship could perform in the service of the mourners. My usual prescription for mental ailments was a long and vigorous walk; today I felt as if I could breathe only in the wide sunshine, so cramped and chilled were my spirits.

The summer residence of the Morelands lay about a mile beyond the Argyll mansion, out of the village proper, on a hillside, which sloped down to the river. It was surrounded by fine grounds, and commanded one of the loveliest views of the Hudson.

“A spirit in my feet

Led me, who knows how?”

in the direction of this now vacant and solitary place⁠—solitary, I believed, with the exception of the gardener and his wife, who lived in a cottage back of the gardens, and who remained the year round, he to attend to outdoor matters, and she to give housekeeper’s care to the closed mansion.

The place had never looked more beautiful to me, not even in the bloom of its June foliage and flowers, than it did as I approached it on this occasion. The frosts had turned to every gorgeous color the tops of the trees which stood out here and there; back of the house, and extending down toward the southern gate, by which I entered, a grove of maples and elms glowed in the autumn sunshine; the lawn in front sloped down to the water’s edge, which flowed by in a blue and lordly stream, bearing on its broad bosom picturesque white ships. In the garden, through which I was now walking, many brilliant flowers still lingered: asters, gold, pink and purple; chrysanthemums; some dahlias which had been covered from the frost; pansies lurking under their broad leaves. It had been the intention of the young couple to make this their permanent home after their marriage, going to the city only for a couple of the winter months. The very next week, I had heard, Eleanor expected to go down to help Henry in his selection of new furniture.

Here the mansion lay, bathed in the rich sunshine; the garden sparkled with flowers as the river with ripples, so full, as it were, of conscious, joyous life, while the master of all lay in a darkened room awaiting his narrow coffin. Never had the uncertainty of human purposes so impressed me as when I looked abroad over that stately residence and thought of the prosperous future which had come to so awful a standstill. I gathered a handful of pansies⁠—they were Eleanor’s favorites. As I approached the house by the garden, I came nearly upon the portico which extended across its western front before I perceived that it was occupied. Sitting on its outer edge, with one arm half wound around one of its pillars, and her bonnet in the grass at her feet, I beheld the sewing-girl after whom I had dispatched an officer to New York. She did not perceive me, and I had an opportunity of studying the face of the woman who had fallen under my suspicion, when she was unaware that my eye was upon it, and when her soul looked out of it, unveiled, in the security of solitude. The impression which she made upon me was that of despair. It was written on attitude and expression. It was neither grief nor remorse⁠—it was blank despair. It must have been half an hour that I remained quiet, watching her. In all that time she never stirred hand nor eyelid; her glance was upon the greensward at her feet. When I turn to that page of my memory, I see her, photographed, as it were, upon it⁠—every fold of the dark dress, which was some worsted substance, frayed, but neat; the black shawl, bordered, drawn close about the slender shoulders, which had the slight, habitual stoop of those who ply the needle for a living; the jetty hair pushed back from her forehead, the marble whiteness and rigidity of the face and mouth.

It was a face made to express passion. And, although the only passion expressed now was that of despair, so intense that it grew like apathy, I could easily see how the rounded chin and full lips could melt into softer moods. The forehead was rather low, but fair, consorting with the oval of the cheek and chin; the brows dark and rather heavy. I remembered the wild black eyes which I had seen the previous day, and could guess at their hidden fires.

This was a girl to attract interest at any time, and I mutely wondered what had entangled the threads of her fate in the glittering web of a higher fortune, which was now suddenly interwoven with the pall of death. All her movements had been such as to confirm my desire to ascertain her connection, if any, with the tragedy. It seemed to me that if I could see her eyes, before she was conscious of observance, I could tell whether there was guilt, or only sorrow, in her heart; therefore I remained quiet, waiting. But I had mistaken my powers, or the eyes overbore them. When she did lift them, as a steamer came puffing around the base of the mountain which ran down into the river at the east, and they suddenly encountered mine, where I stood not ten feet from her, I saw only black, unfathomable depths, pouring out a trouble so intense, that my own gaze dropped beneath their power.

She did not start, upon observing me, which, as I thought, a guilty person, buried in self-accusing reveries, would have done⁠—it seemed only slowly to penetrate her consciousness that a stranger was confronting her; when I raised my eyes, which had sunk beneath the intensity of hers, she was moving rapidly away toward the western gate.

“Miss Sullivan, you have forgotten your bonnet.”