Lovelier than Daylight Read online

  Johann swung his knees around to sit sideways in his chair. “Is something wrong?”

  “Not really. Well . . .” His father examined the bedpost as if checking it for flaws. “You’ve never brought a guest to a dance before.”

  “Yes.” He had known it would come up sooner or later.

  “A beautiful young woman, Miss Hanby. And with a good mind.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you have come to know her through your newspaper work?”

  “We happened to share a train car on the way to Westerville when I escorted Henry Corbin and his lager.”

  “I see.” His father rubbed at the post with his thumb. “She is a teetotaler.”

  “She spoke with you about it?”

  “When we danced. She didn’t pursue the subject—I did.”

  That was a relief. She might be ardent, but he wouldn’t expect her to be rude to her host.

  His father looked at him. “I see you like her very much.”

  Johann scratched a sudden itch on the back of his hand.

  “Your mother saw too. She asked me to speak with you because she is concerned.”

  “About what?”

  “Your heart. She doesn’t think a Westerville woman who hates all drink would be a happy match.”

  Johann avoided rolling his eyes with effort. “Mother only sees one match for me—Lotte—and you know that well. That’s the real source of her concern.”

  “Ja.” His father smiled. “You do not like Lotte?”

  “I like her, Father. But she is like a little sister, except awkward to be around. She’s just a girl.”

  “And Miss Hanby is not just a girl.”

  “No.”

  “What do you see in her?” His father’s intent look meant there was no sidestepping this topic—he was determined to ferret out the truth.

  Johann stood up and walked to the window to look out on Wall Street where a few women in aprons headed north to the market. “You should get to know her, Father. She is very intelligent, scientific even. But a caring woman too.”

  “I liked what I saw, except that she is so narrow-minded about our business. But she did appear to listen to my perspective, which is more than I can say for most women of her convictions.”

  “She has good reason to be passionate about the subject. Her sister is married to a cruel drunk and recently vanished. The husband claims she ran off to a lover, but in truth, she may not even be living. Their six children, Susanna’s nieces and nephews, have gone to institutions. It’s only two weeks before three of them will be sent away forever to new homes. And the Hanbys can’t adopt them because they haven’t the money to support them.” He realized he had been tapping his pen on the desk and spattering ink droplets. He sighed and wiped them away with one finger. “So you see, she’s sensitive on the issue of drink, as she’s about to be deprived of the children she loves.”

  His father swiveled to gaze at the framed artwork on the wall, something Johann’s sister Maria had done at the Turnverein last year, a painting of their new church. He was quiet for so long Johann wondered if he would speak.

  “That is a tragic story.” His father’s voice was husky. “I’m sorry for Miss Hanby and her family.”

  “Yes.” They both looked at the painting, the lambent glow of the stained glass that Maria had captured in rich colors, the church lit up at night.

  “You know Fritz and I lost our little brother in the rebellion of ’48,” his father said.

  “Yes, sir.” Of course he would never forget this story. Through his childhood, his father and his Uncle Fritz had each lit a candle once every year, on the night Louis had gone missing at five years old in the chaos of a popular uprising in Bavaria. But when Uncle Fritz died in the War Between the States, his father had stopped lighting the candles, as if his loss was too deep for one vigil flame to bear without its twin.

  His father cleared his throat. “Where are the children, her nieces and nephews?”

  “In the Hannah Neil Mission and some other charity called the Hare Home.”

  “I know of the Hare Home.” His father looked troubled and rose to his feet. “If you’ll excuse me, I must go inspect the cellar.”

  “I’ll be there in half an hour.”

  His father walked out and pulled the door closed with a soft click.

  Good. Perhaps his father would explain it to his mother and she would also see Susanna in a different light.

  But now he must finish his article, or Mr. Reinhardt would not have time to give it to the typesetter.

  He could not sacrifice objectivity for even the most captivating of women. He laid the nib of his pen to the page and let the ink flow.

  Twenty-Two

  SUSANNA’S FEET FELT HEAVY ALL THE WAY DOWN State Street, though the mud had dried and her shoes were clean. The weight was in her spirit—the knowledge that it would be six more days until she could see the children, and the frustration of seeing a woman so like Rachel, but having to wait for her uncle to make more inquiries. Aunt Ann agreed, now, that Uncle Will should go ask after the auburn-haired woman at the docks, but he had told Susanna he had to finish a saddle first. That money was vital if they ever hoped to get the children. So Susanna had been helping him with every free moment, counting every hour of the two days until they could go back to Columbus to hunt for her sister. And even then she still would not be allowed to see Clara, Wesley, and Daniel. The thought cramped her heart— the children might think she did not care, that they had been left to the Hare Home forever.

  The stores were full of activity on this Saturday, all the women and travelers out buying what they needed before the Sabbath quiet of tomorrow. She eyed the saloon ahead of her with distaste. Even from yards away she could hear the hubbub of voices. Corbin was infuriatingly successful with travelers and laborers from the outskirts of town.

  She hurried her pace as she drew alongside the saloon. She did not look toward it as her shoes clanked on the boards of the sidewalk. A roar of noise from the revelers inside made her flinch.

  Something hurtled into her, knocking her sideways. She landed hard, half on the walk, half in the street. She wheezed against her corset and pushed herself up to her hands, half-dazed.

  “Miss Hanby!” A young man’s voice called out, and after a moment Abel Wilson knelt next to her and helped her up.

  Angry words flew behind them. She looked over her shoulder and saw a small knot of young men, all students from the look of them, standing over a drunken laborer about their own age, who was struggling to his feet and snarling at them.

  “You owe this lady an apology!” one of them shouted.

  “Get away from me, college boy. If she tries to walk into a saloon, it’s her own fault.”

  Susanna gasped. Before she could defend herself, Abel spoke through gritted teeth at the tousle-haired farm boy. “How dare you? You flew out of it like some kind of demon and knocked her down.”

  A rough-looking man swung open the door of the saloon and looked out. “And good riddance to you!” He growled at the farm boy, who flushed even redder and staggered toward the older man, raising a fist.

  One of the college men pushed the farm boy down on the sidewalk, where he scrabbled for footing. “First you hurt this lady, and then you would brawl in front of her? You, sir, are no gentleman.”

  “And you, sir, are no man at all,” the farm boy slurred. He reeled to his feet and grabbed the college man by his shirt, slinging him against the wall.

  “Miss Hanby, come with me!” Abel Wilson took her arm and hurried her into the nearest store—Dusenberry’s Shoes. She heard oaths and thumping behind them as the door closed.

  “Stay in here, please, miss,” Abel said. “We’re going to make him answer for this. We can’t have young ladies assaulted by drunks on our own streets.”

  “Don’t risk yourself on my behalf, Mr. Wilson.”

  “I will stand up for you, Miss Hanby, and for every other lady in town, and for Otterbein. Yo
u see if Corbin doesn’t answer for it. He’s ruining our town.” The fury and distress in his voice washed through the room even after the door slammed behind his running feet.

  “Do you need to sit down, Miss Hanby?” It was Mrs. Dusenberry, the handsome woman who had first suggested the women’s prayer meetings against Corbin. She wore a neat jacket and bustle, as befitted the wife of a storekeeper who must wait on customers. She pulled up a chair and Susanna sat, catching her breath.

  “A glass of lemonade?”

  She nodded, still feeling almost deaf and dumb. What was happening? She didn’t want to be in the center of it, and yet the college men were right, they had to do something about Corbin.

  Mrs. Dusenberry brought a cool glass of lemonade from the back room to Susanna. “I’m sorry, my dear—I know it must have been frightening. I saw through the window.”

  Susanna was glad the older woman did not seem as angry as the boys. Every thump and yell from outside made her more unhappy. “I don’t want them to fight.” She sipped the cool liquid. The glass soothed her scratched hands.

  “I know, dear. Neither does anyone. Or at least, no one I know. We all just want it to go away.”

  “The saloon?”

  “Yes.”

  “So do I. But not through force.”

  Mrs. Dusenberry sighed. “What happens is not completely up to us. Most of the townspeople are good folk, but some are too rash. Your uncle won’t be able to hold them off forever.”

  “He’s trying.”

  “I know. We’ll have to keep praying for his effort.”

  She brought a cool cloth and washed Susanna’s abraded hands. When the noise died down and the street was empty, Susanna slipped out the door and hurried home. She did not want to see anyone else—only to be left alone. Her troubles were mountainous enough without taking on the whole town’s.

  The setting sun threw the familiar contours of the Westerville train station into silhouette beside the train. Johann could not have stayed away longer, not with both the pull of the story and his desire to see Susanna again. He should go see if he could offer any more assistance, or invent some plan to delay the inevitable at the orphanage.

  But first he must go to the hotel and put his small traveling case in his room.

  He ascended the stairs and headed for the dining hall and common area. A quick bite to eat and then he would use the details Mrs. Hanby had mentioned at the Biergarten to find his way to the Hanbys’ house.

  Despite three visits to the hotel, he was still unaccustomed to the odd spectacle of a dining hall without lager or wine, the diners quiet, not conversing but eating in silence, some reading newspapers.

  He had almost finished eating when a cluster of young people at a far table stood up with a scrape of chairs. He held up his own paper to disguise his interest and then peered around the edge.

  It was those students—the would-be dashing young men who had been so full of bravado in the church, the ones who had stolen out at night on some mysterious errand when he followed them. They looked grim and simultaneously excited. It was not a reassuring combination.

  He waited until they had filed out across the plank floor and stomped down the porch steps. This time he would stick closer and see what they were doing.

  It was no surprise that they walked once again through the shadows down the avenue and to the same large building as before. But when they emerged this time, they were not carrying anything. He remained in his vantage point, hidden by the darkness, until their rustling and footfalls had disappeared back around the corner onto State Street.

  He would not be dissuaded easily tonight. He stole over to the door they had used. What was this place? No way to tell, though it clearly provided storage. A tile facility? Inside the large main room, stacks of tile towered ten or more feet in the air, piled against walls, red-brown where the light fell on one stack through a window.

  The students could not have been thieving—what idiocy that would be, to throw away their future as college men to purloin a few tiles as a prank.

  He made his way slowly around the perimeter. At the far end, he found a stone stairway, steep, cut down into what must be the cellar. He glanced around once more, then took his matches from his pocket and lit an oil lamp that hung on the wall by the stairs. Down he went, only the small flickering light battling against the dark hole of the cellar.

  It was a tiny cellar, not good for much but a little storage. Odds and ends were piled up so he could hardly move more than a step from the bottom of the stairs.

  But something caught his eye.

  Two small barrels labeled gunpowder sat right there within arm’s reach, where one could pick them up and run away. And they were just the size of the object he had seen the young men carrying a few nights ago.

  Well, he would ensure this gunpowder would do no evil tonight. He didn’t know who owned it, but as the young men seemed to know of its existence, it was suspect. He would not feel guilty for taking something that might be used illicitly to harm others.

  He put the lantern down and scooped the barrels into his arms. Now he could not carry the lantern. He blew it out and left it, feeling his way up the stairs with the aid of memory. At last he made it to the floor where the moonlight from the windows helped him find his way out.

  The powder was heavy, and it must be very dense in there. Its acrid smell was not confined by the barrel and he might have powder smears on his shirt tomorrow. Merely hiding the powder would not be good enough. He had to ruin it beyond use, given what he had already seen in this town.

  After only two minutes’ walk through the trees, he saw the glint of light on water. The creek. He climbed down the bank and opened the plug of the first barrel with his pocket knife.

  A stream of peppery powder poured out when he inverted the barrel and held it over the water. When it was empty, he floated the barrel in the sluggish current until it bobbed under the bridge and vanished. He repeated his work on the second barrel and then dusted off his hands.

  If those young men were the vigilantes who had damaged the saloon, they would not have the help of explosives. He could go see Susanna with a clear conscience and talk to her about her nieces and nephews. Corbin would have to deal with the rest of it himself.

  Twenty-Three

  A KNOCK CAME AT THE HANBYS’ DOOR. SHOULD SUSANNA answer? Uncle Will was out at the men’s meeting, where they were celebrating the exoneration of the Westerville ministers by the Columbus court. And he was also speaking out against illegal action, yet again, which had Aunt Ann worried. She was rinsing one of Uncle Will’s collars with extra vigor in the washbasin in the kitchen. And it wasn’t even washday.

  Susanna had better go to the door. She hoped she would not find another note on the doormat like the one that had come yesterday.

  This is your last warning, Hanby. No more about the saloon, or we’ll harm you and yours.

  The memory of the black, hostile lettering still gave her pause. But she couldn’t become so afraid that she refused to answer the door—what next, refusing to go out of the house? Susanna set her knitting on the table beside her, then glanced in the small brass mirror on the wall to make sure she was presentable.

  When she opened the door, the sight fell on her like a load of logs, stunning her into silence.

  “Evenin’.” George Leeds stood on the stoop, his shirt and hat as crumpled as ever, his beard still oily-looking.

  “Hello.”

  “Aren’t you going to invite me in? I have news I think you’ll like.”

  Rachel. Susanna’s pulse quickened and she took a breath.

  He grinned through his sparse, oily beard. He looked as if he had a lost a tooth or two since she last saw him, probably from falling facedown in a drunken stupor. He had the rotten, nutty odor of the chronic drunk, though she didn’t smell the sharpness of fresh liquor.

  “Come in.” She twitched away from his coat in disgust as he brushed by her.

  “Susanna, who is i
t?” her aunt called.

  She did not respond, looking warily at George. He threw his hat on the table, seated himself in Uncle Will’s chair, and propped his legs on the footstool, just as if it were his home. If only Uncle Will were here, George would not dare behave so insolently. But her uncle was off at the temperance meeting.

  Susanna perched rigid on the edge of a ladder-back chair, feet on the ground, hands in her lap, and stared at her sister’s husband.

  Aunt Ann came out of the back, wiping her hands on her apron. “Oh.” She stopped on the threshold of the sitting room.

  “Miz Hanby.” George did not get up but lolled against the chair with his head back. What a rude, sorry excuse for a man. And with his oily head, it was a good thing her aunt had cotton doilies on the backs of her humble furniture.

  “An unexpected visit, Mr. Leeds.” Aunt Ann amazed Susanna with her ability to seem unruffled.

  “I was telling my sister-in-law here that I have news I think you’ll want to hear.”

  “Indeed?” Aunt Ann kept a calm façade but stroked the arm of the chair almost absentmindedly as if using its brocade to steady herself.

  “I have reached a decision that will interest you.” He balanced the heel of one boot on the toe of another, as if sitting outside with another man talking of chickens, not talking about a missing wife with her two grieving female relations.

  “It hasn’t been an easy decision to make,” he drawled.

  Susanna wanted to scream but continued to breathe in and out in steady channels of air.

  George scratched his chin. “But if you still want me to sign papers and get the children back so you can keep ’em, I will.”

  What? She rehearsed his words again in her mind, a balloon of unreality about to burst into joy, rising, rising—

  He put both feet back on the stool again. “For a thousand dollars.”

  What?

  “What?” her aunt asked simultaneously. “I must have misheard you, Mr. Leeds.”

  “No, ma’am.” He shook his head with solemnity. “I have many expenses in my farm business, and so this is a way we can all get what we want and need.”