Echoes of Mercy: A Novel (47 page)

A dark basement room. A cot stinking of her own vomit. A rope chafing her ankle. Harsh voices.
“Do it again, and this time do it right! If I find one speck of food on another plate, I’ll flay the flesh from your back!” “There’ll be no sleep for you until you’ve learned to break those eggs without crushing the shells. You’ll be useless as a cook’s helper if you can’t perform such a simple task.”
Stinging slaps, angry scowls, an empty stomach, an aching soul, and always a weariness so heavy she feared it was etched into her bones.

Those years in the Remington household, she’d been hopeless, believing there was no escape. But God had saved her from a childhood of sadness and abuse and had granted her the opportunity to redeem the ugliness for something good. Would He save her from this mess as well? And what of Ollie, traveling to his father’s home, unaware of Hightower’s evil intentions? She longed to warn him, but she couldn’t even lift her arms.

Dear Lord, please intervene. Prevent evil from having the victory. Be the Rescuer we need, Father, please … Please …

She drifted into a restless sleep, her dreams woven with darks and lights—ugly pictures from her early childhood and flashes of warmth from her years with Noble and Annamarie. Faces—Letta, Lank, Lesley, Kesia, Ollie, Hightower—paraded through her dreams, making her either groan or smile in response. Suddenly all the dream people gathered into a circle, each carrying a pot or a pan and a wooden spoon.
No, not the kitchen. Don’t make me go to the kitchen
. Caroline’s heart pounded as they formed a band of sorts, using the spoons to thump and clang.

Thump! Thump! Thump!
“Caroline? Caroline, are you here?”

She huddled in the corner, hiding from the strange parade, hands protectively over her head.
No, don’t find me. I don’t wanna go in the kitchen!

“Caroline?”

She jolted awake, her pulse beating as hard as the clanking pots in her dream. The voice … Had it come from inside her head? “Caroline? Where are you?”

Hope ignited. Real! The voice was real! And she recognized the caller—Noble. She tried to cry out in reply, but the gag muffled her voice. She flopped from side to side as Noble continued to call her name. The mattress squawked in protest, but the soft noise wouldn’t carry beyond the door. She needed to make a loud noise—quickly, before he moved to another floor or left altogether.

Taking a deep breath, Caroline rolled sideways and hit the floor. Unable to block her fall, she landed on the side of her head and her shoulder, sending a shaft of pain from her neck to her elbow. But she gritted her teeth and ignored
the throbbing. She wriggled her way around to the end of the cot. Then, with a prayer for God’s strength winging from her heart, she hooked her heels beneath the crossbar and lifted the cot several inches. She let it fall, her ears ringing with the clank of the iron legs against the concrete floor.

She repeated the action—
clank! ker-clank! clank, clank!
—her face angled toward the door and her heart beating with hope. Would he hear? Would he come?

Thudding footsteps. Noble’s voice calling, “Caroline? Is that you? Are you in there?”

She clanked the cot’s legs against the floor once more. Then with a final vicious thrust, she hefted the frame onto its side. The movement flipped her onto her belly again, but the cot crashed against the next one, the clatter of iron against iron deafening in the closed room.

The door burst open, and Noble stepped through. Light flowed into the room, attacking her eyes. She snapped them shut against the onslaught. Seconds later she felt Noble’s hands on her head.

“Caroline. Oh, Caroline.” The tenderness in his voice matched the gentle removal of her gag. She gulped great drafts of air, her dry throat burning with each intake. Whatever bound her wrists pulled tighter. She gasped as the band cut into her flesh, but then it was yanked away. Her hands went cold, then hot, tingles attacking with such ferocity she bit down on her lip to keep from crying out.

Noble rolled her over and pulled her into a seated position. Bent on one knee before her, he cradled her against his chest. The comforting beat of his heart pounded in her ear. She closed her eyes as his fingers explored her face, her head. Finally she opened her eyes and blinked. The tears of concern and worry swimming in his eyes stung her even worse than the stabbing prickles in her hands and the throbbing in her head.

“I’m sorry I scared you.” Only a hoarse whisper emerged. “But I’m so glad you came.”

“When you didn’t show up at the hotel this afternoon as you’d intended, Annamarie knew something was wrong.” He released her and began to
untangle the knotted sheet from her ankles. “I told her you’d probably gotten caught up in exploring the elevator and lost track of time. I only came to assuage her fears. I didn’t become concerned until I realized the factory was locked up tight and you weren’t in your apartment.” He tossed the mangled sheet aside and embraced her again. “Did Ollie do this to you?”

“No. Gordon Hightower.” She remembered again his sneering promise, and she struggled to her feet. Forcing the words past her parched throat, she grated, “We have to warn Ollie and Fulton Dinsmore!” She tugged at Noble’s hand, explaining the two record books and Hightower’s intention to eliminate Ollie and Mr. Dinsmore so he couldn’t be prosecuted for theft. Noble’s eyes widened in shock as he listened. She finished, “I’m still not sure if Bratcher’s death was intentional, but I think he discovered Hightower’s scheme to steal money from the factory. So if he was murdered, it wasn’t because of his stance on child labor.”

Noble slipped his arm around her waist and assisted her out the door and across the factory floor. “We can’t do anything more for Harmon, God rest his soul, but hopefully we can prevent anyone else from losing his life because of Gordon Hightower’s selfishness. We’ll make a telephone call to Fulton Dinsmore and then check train schedules. We’ll take the first one available to Wichita.”

They stepped from the factory into the long shadows of late afternoon. Although the back alley of the factory smelled musty and hinted of rotting vegetables, Caroline drank in the air. The scent of freedom.

She caught Noble’s arm and turned a grateful look on him.

“Thank you again for being my rescuer,” she whispered. “You’re always there when I need you.”

Noble chuckled, although his wan skin still held the remembrance of the worry he’d experienced. “Silly girl … Isn’t that what a father is for?”

Caroline smiled and nodded. Yes, that was exactly what a Father was for. She’d have to trust that their heavenly Father, who knew all and saw all, would rescue Ollie and Mr. Dinsmore from whatever vile scheme Hightower had planned.

The sky slowly faded to a purplish pink in the west. The wind had eased, but the air was colder as darkness crept across the landscape. Letta shivered uncontrollably, but she kept her hold on her brother. No matter how long it took for help to come—because it would come!—she wouldn’t let Lesley fall.

He moaned in her arms, twisting his face back and forth against her shoulder. “C-c-cold, Letta. An’ m-my leg h-h-h-hurts.”

“Shh, I know.” She rubbed his back. Her hands were so numb she barely felt the scratchy wool of his coat. “Won’t be much longer now. Lank’ll get here soon.”

“S-s-scared …”

Letta was too, but she wouldn’t admit it. The longer she sat there staring at the ugly trap, the more worried she became. Whoever had put that thing in the water intended to catch something big. Would the animal come around tonight while she and Lesley were stuck tight? Resolve stiffened her spine. If some big, ferocious critter attacked, it’d have to get past her to get to Lesley. A shudder rattled through her.
Please, God, don’t let some big critter come
.

An odd
clank, clank
—sharp yet muffled—reached Letta’s ears. She clutched Lesley close and looked right and left. Was it teeth grinding together? Claws banging against the ground? Her heart pounded hard, and her breath came in little puffs of fear.

Lesley pawed at her shoulder with his bluish fingers, his head hanging back. “W-what was that, L-L-Letta?”

“Dunno.” She lowered her voice to a rasping whisper. “But hush!”

Lesley pressed his face to her neck and clung hard, soft sobs shaking his shoulders. She tried to hold her breath so she could hear better. The rattle-clank continued in an odd offbeat, growing louder with each passing second. A terror-filled scream built in her throat, and it took every ounce of strength to hold it inside. She squeezed Lesley, crunched her eyes closed, and listened to the ominous rattle-clank draw closer, closer.

And then a voice. “Luh-Letta! I guh-guh-got help! Me an’ Mr. Muh-Moore—we’re cuh-cuh-comin’!”

The scream she’d held back released in a shuddering cry of joy, relief, and long-held fear. She cried against Lesley’s hair. “Help’s here, Lesley. You’re gonna be fine. Help’s here.”

Gordon moved in his typical stealthy gait along the bricked pathway leading to the Dinsmores’ stately home. In the gentle glow of oil-fueled street lamps, the house’s pale-yellow bricks took on the appearance of blocks of gold. He paused midway up the walk and allowed his gaze to follow the lines of the white fluted columns supporting the milled portico and all the way to the brass finial topping the three-story-high round turret. How would it feel to look out from the highest windows of that turret?

He allowed himself a moment of uncharacteristic whimsy, imagining looking down at the less fortunate passing along the street. When the factory became his, he’d be able to buy a house just like this one. Maybe even bigger. He pulled in a deep breath and released it on a sigh. The dream tingled in his fingertips. Soon, very soon, it would all be his.

But first … the necessary business.

Swallowing the gorge that rose from his belly, he pushed himself into motion and strode up the six wide steps leading to the portico. A large brass door knocker in the shape of a gargoyle’s face waited in the center of the carved door. Gordon brought the knocker down hard three times, then stepped back, his pulse roaring in his ears.

Within moments he was rewarded by the door swinging wide open, and none other than Fulton Dinsmore himself stood in the light of a brass-and-crystal chandelier. Attired in a rust-colored, silk dressing jacket tied at the waist and brown leather slippers, he appeared relaxed, even regal. He held a pipe—so highly polished it gleamed in the chandelier’s glow—in his mouth.

Jealousy wrapped icy tentacles around Gordon’s heart. He wanted this life
for himself. He pushed aside the raw emotion and forced a smile. “Mr. Dinsmore, good evening.”

Dinsmore’s brow furrowed briefly. “Gordon …” He removed the pipe from his mouth and gestured Gordon into the foyer, then with a click shut the door behind them. The aroma of the cherry-scented tobacco was nearly intoxicating in the small space. “I presume you’re here to clear up the misunderstanding.”

Gordon gave a little jolt of surprise. So the man hadn’t believed Moore! Perhaps he would be spared the repugnant task of disposing of the pair after all. Relief wound itself around his conscience. He nodded. “Yes, sir.” He glanced through the wide doorway into a beautifully decorated parlor. “Is Moore here?”

“Moore? No.” Dinsmore led him into the parlor, where a fire crackled behind the grate, cozy and inviting. “Have a seat. Is Moore coming, too?”

Confused, Gordon sank into one of the chairs facing the ornate fireplace. Had Carrie Lang lied to him? If Moore wasn’t here, where was he? He loosened his dry tongue and spoke calmly. “I thought he might have carried the tale of the … misunderstanding.”

Dinsmore settled into the chair opposite Gordon’s, a puzzled frown on his face. “No, I haven’t seen Moore. However, I had a rather unsettling telephone call late this afternoon from a man named Noble Dempsey, apparently an agent with the Kansas-Nebraska Labor Commission. He claimed you’d”—Dinsmore chuckled—“kidnapped Carrie Lang.”

Gordon’s jaw dropped in genuine shock. “Wh-what?” Who was Dempsey? How had this unknown man become entangled in Gordon’s activities?