Echoes of Mercy: A Novel (20 page)

The bell continued to toll until everyone settled into the pews, and then the final note echoed for several seconds, thrilling Caroline with its pure tone. Across the congregation men rested their hats on their knees, and mothers bounced infants on their laps. An organist pressed her fingers to the keys, and all at once the parishioners opened their mouths and poured forth a joyous hymn: “Come, ye thankful people, come …”

Tears stung Caroline’s eyes, closing her throat and rendering her unable to add her voice to the others’. But she sang with her heart, glorying in the wonderful promise found in the words of the song. “God, our Maker, doth provide for our wants to be supplied.” She glanced at the children, hoping they were listening. God knew these lost ones wanted to have a home and to be loved, just as she had when she was their age. God had provided for her, and He would provide for them, too.

The realization washed her in an all-consuming peace, and warmth flooded her. She wrapped her arms around the children, placing them into God’s keeping with the gesture, while praying for Him to grant all they needed to grow into happy, healthy adults.
Give me all I need, too, Lord. Bestow Your gifts as You see fit
.

As she finished her prayer, she caught a movement from the corner of her
eye—someone coming in late. There was a space at the end of their pew if Lank shifted closer to Letta. She tapped his shoulder and motioned for him to move in. He scowled, but he obeyed, and the man who’d entered late, his coat collar high and his hat pulled low, slid into the space Lank had created.

He removed his hat, revealing a head of thick, gold-blond hair. Caroline’s pulse skipped a beat. Was it. Then he turned his face and caught her staring. He smiled, his green-gold eyes twinkling.

Caroline zipped her attention forward as another hymn began. Even though she didn’t look at Ollie Moore again during the entire service, she was all too aware of his presence on the end of the pew.
Bestow Your gifts
, she’d prayed, and Ollie Moore had plopped himself down within arm’s reach. What was God trying to do to her?

Gordon propped his crossed heels on the edge of his desk and linked his hands behind his head. He released a long, contented sigh. How he loved Sundays. Quiet. Solitary. The one day of the week when he could do whatever he pleased without worrying who might see.

Last Sunday had been particularly delightful, thanks to the newest sorter. The silly girl hadn’t even blinked in apprehension when he’d instructed her to meet him for private instruction on her new job. Sweet, naive Mandy … His cheeks twitched from the effort of holding back his grin. Now that she understood what he meant by “private instruction,” she probably wouldn’t ever come again for such a lesson, but it didn’t matter. Mandy wasn’t the only naive girl in the city, as he well knew.

Dropping his feet to the floor, he pushed off from his chair and strode to the hallway. He paused at the top of the stairs, one ear turned toward the lower level to better catch the silence. Without machines operating, feet running here and there over wood floors, voices calling requests and demands, he felt as though he could hear the factory’s solid brick walls sighing in bliss. He added a satisfied sigh of his own, reveling in the marvelous quiet.

Growing up in the Southridge Orphans’ Home outside of Chicago, he’d never known what quiet meant. Kids always squabbling for a scrap of food, for a bit of attention. He’d never been one to squabble, though. No need to raise your voice when actions spoke louder than words ever could.

He hadn’t been the biggest boy in the orphanage, but he’d learned size didn’t matter if you were tough. So he never squabbled. He just puffed himself up like an aggressive alley cat and took what he wanted. And why not? All
those benevolence barrels that showed up on the orphanage doorstep, delivered by ladies in black dresses with mouths pursed in sympathy for “the poor little orphan children,” never held anything of value.

No, nobody ever
gave
something of worth. If a person wanted something, he had to take it. He’d learned that early, and he’d never forgotten the lesson. So on Sundays, Gordon gathered as much quiet as he could, only making a noise if he wanted to. Such control silence offered.

On tiptoe he descended three steps. A board squeaked. He frowned. Tomorrow he’d have the new first-shift handyman tighten the joints to remove the annoying sound. Then he continued to the bottom with steps so light and soundless not even a rabbit would have been startled by his progress.

He continued his trek across the floor, placing his feet with such stealth the floorboards didn’t register his weight. He’d make a first-class detective if he ever decided to give up managing the factory. But he wasn’t ready to leave this post. No other position could offer him more power, greater satisfaction … or more opportunity to abundantly pad his pockets.

A laugh built in his throat, but he swallowed it, determined not to destroy the peacefulness of his surroundings. But it was difficult. Mr. Fulton Dinsmore was an educated man, schooled in England at one of the finest universities. While in Europe, he’d sampled every confection Switzerland, Germany, and Sweden offered and had brought back the key ingredients to create creamier, more flavorful, intensely rich chocolates. Then he’d closed his father’s small factory in Chicago and opened this Kansas factory in the center of the country where he could cost-effectively ship his delicacies to every state in the United States as well as the provinces of Canada.

Fulton Dinsmore had put the “world-famous” in what had been just Dinsmore’s Chocolates. Shrewd, people called him. Some even claimed he was a genius. And he’d placed orphaned Gordon Hightower in a position of leadership.

The laugh bubbled up until he could no longer hold it at bay. Gordon threw back his head and let it roll. The raucous noise bounced from the tin ceiling and back, filling the entire floor with his merriment. He allowed
himself a full minute of unsuppressed glee, then abruptly snapped his jaw closed. The echo rang for a few more seconds, slowly fading into silence.

Gordon smiled into the quiet, flicking his gaze here and there, filling the empty corners with images of industrious workers. But instead of tan aprons bearing the logo for Dinsmore’s World-Famous Chocolates, in his imagination every worker wore brown—chocolate-colored—aprons with the name HIGHTOWER stitched in bold yellow letters in the center of the bib.

“Hightower’s World-Famous Chocolates,” Gordon whispered, as if sharing a secret with a friend. The title tasted sweet. And even sweeter would be the money and prestige that came along with it.

Some might call him unappreciative, even felonious, for plotting against the man who’d plucked him from the hungry throng at the orphanage. But he knew better. He remembered the distinguished gentleman placing his hand on Gordon’s scrawny shoulder and promising he’d now have a better life.

The thoughts that had filled Gordon’s mind—of living in a fine house, eating at a table laden with wondrous foods, sleeping in a big bed with a feather mattress in a room all his own. He’d expected the rich man to make him part of his family. But instead, Dinsmore had deposited him with the manager of the factory and instructed the man to teach Gordon all he needed to know to be a good worker.

A good worker.

Gordon punched the air, nearly throwing himself off balance. He’d learned, all right. He’d learned every despicable task from lowliest trash burner to chocolate mixer to bookkeeper. And after nearly two decades of daily toil, Dinsmore had handed the reins of the factory to him and beamed, “You’re my success story, Gordon. I’m proud of you, son.”
Son
. Ha! Carefully trained work mule—that’s what he’d been. That’s what he’d always be until he could claim the factory as his own. And the day was coming.

With a little hop step of happiness, he angled back toward the stairway and his loft office. This time he walked with force, enjoying the thud of his heels bouncing back from the walls. He flopped into his chair, opened the hidden compartment in his desk, and smiled down at the journal containing the past two years’ painstakingly recorded transactions.

Another year—perhaps a year and a half—of manipulating the books, of squirreling away assets, of groveling to Fulton Dinsmore, and then he could purchase the factory with the man’s own money. Duping Dinsmore would be the culmination of Gordon’s fondest dreams.

A
tap, tap, tap
intruded upon Caroline’s dreams, rousing her from a sound nap. She sat up, trying to determine the source of the noise. On the opposite side of the iron bed, Letta slept, undisturbed. Lank and Lesley lay coiled together like a pair of puppies on a quilt on the floor. Neither so much as twitched an eyelid in response to the tapping. Caroline frowned. Had she imagined it?

It came again—
tap, tap, tap
—and this time she was able to discern the source. Knuckles on a doorframe. Moving as quickly and quietly as possible, she crossed to the door and opened it before the knocking disturbed the children. After their emotional morning they needed rest.

A young boy in a frayed jacket, hat several sizes too big, and shoes with the toes worn through stood in the hallway. When he spotted her, his chest puffed out importantly, and he thrust a folded piece of paper toward her. “Telegram, miss!”

“Shh!”

The boy wilted.

She hadn’t intended to crush him. Caroline stepped into the hallway, closing the door with a soft click behind her. She smiled at the crestfallen youth. “I have children sleeping.”

“Oh. Sorry, ma’am.” He bobbed the telegram at her again. “S’posed to give you this.”

Caroline took the telegram and unfolded it. She read the brief message, her brow furrowed.

The boy rocked in place. “If you wanna reply, I can take it back with me an’ get it sent for you.”

She’d need to reply but not until she’d had a chance to speak with Letta. She tucked the telegram into her pocket. “No, thank you.”

Once again his shoulders drooped. He turned and, head low, began to scuff his way up the hallway.

“Wait a moment,” Caroline called. He paused, and she retrieved a nickel from the little coin pouch in her pocket. An extravagant tip, but she didn’t regret it when the boy’s face lit with joy. He smiled his thanks and bounded up the hallway and around the corner. Caroline waited until his thudding footsteps receded, then reentered the apartment.

The boys still slept, but Letta sat up in the bed, her pale face aimed in Caroline’s direction. “Somethin’ wrong?”

Instead of answering, Caroline quirked her finger, beckoning Letta to come near. They moved to the opposite side of the room from the bed and perched on the tufted settee—Caroline’s only sitting-area furniture.

She removed the telegram from her pocket and pressed it flat against her knee. “Remember the messages we sent to your aunt this morning?” She’d had to send two twenty-word telegrams to include everything she wanted to say—informing the woman of her brother’s death, requesting instructions concerning his burial, and asking who should be responsible for the children.

Letta nodded, her expression solemn.

“She’s responded already. But I’m not sure what to make of it.” Caroline read the brief missive aloud, leaving out the intrusive
stop
at the end of each phrase. “ ‘Can’t come. Pauper’s grave fine. How old are youngsters?’ ”

Letta wrapped her arms across herself as if she were cold and stared at the little scrap of paper. “Don’t know as I’m surprised she ain’t comin’. Last time she came, she an’ Pa had a terrible fallin’ out. Can’t remember what it was all about, but it was a long time ago. Lesley wasn’t far outta diapers. She ain’t been to see us since, not even at Christmastime.” The girl shrugged, tossing her head. “It don’t matter. I didn’t much like her anyway.”

Caroline crumpled the edge of the telegram between her fingers and thumb, wishing she could give Letta’s aunt a good pinch for caring so little. “Are you sure you don’t know where your mother is? I could send her a telegram if—”