Mercury's Rise (Silver Rush 04) (14 page)

“On our trip down from Leadville, Miss Carothers and I spoke.” She actually blushed. “It wasn’t gossip, really. I was curious about Leadville, and the two of you. Two women, traveling alone, it seemed so brave and adventurous. In any case, Miss Carothers indicated that you are a most uncommon woman, that you have a courage and a way of seeing things, a propensity to action that is unusual, but welcome out here in the wilder parts of this frontier.”

Inez shook her head, partly in frustration with Susan’s vocal enthusiasms, partly at the idea that Manitou and Leadville could be considered a “frontier.” “Miss Carothers has an artistic and creative nature, and is given to reading penny dreadfuls. She sometimes exaggerates.”

Mrs. Pace persisted, “She said you have helped her and others who have been in desperate straits. I have no one to turn to here, Mrs. Stannert, no one but you and Miss Carothers. I believe there is something strange going on here. And it’s not just me. Someone else is convinced as well.” She stopped.

“Who?” Inez, despite her own woes, found herself being pulled into the vortex of the widow’s pain and determination.

Mrs. Pace picked up the black hat, smoothed its voluminous veil, and settled it on her head, adjusting the brim. She turned to Inez, one hand ready to pull the veil down.

“Have you met Mr. Robert Calder?” she asked. “He is a guest at this hotel.”

“We were introduced this morning,” said Inez.

She nodded. “I will try to arrange for you to talk with him in some manner that will not draw suspicion nor breach propriety. When you are able, ask him about his brother, about his brother’s stay in Manitou, and what became of him. You’ll see. Not all is as simple as it seems. There is a poison here. Something unhealthy lurks, that needs to be drawn out and held to the light. Something that killed my husband.”

Chapter Fourteen

Leadville

“Mr. Casey, I apologize for dropping in like this yet again.” Inez stepped into her lawyer’s entryway. “It appears I’ve interrupted your noonday meal.”

“In my business, Mrs. Stannert, we are at our clients’ disposal. Although I try to discourage the midnight visits, unless absolutely necessary.” He held the door open with one hand, and a linen napkin with the other. “You know the way to my office,” he added.

The scent of roast beef and onions followed Inez as she entered the office and slid into the chair opposite his desk. No sooner had Casey taken the upholstered chair on the other side than Inez bounded to her feet, as if they occupied opposite ends of a seesaw.

Casey, ever the gentleman, immediately rose as well. “Is something amiss?”

“There has been an unfortunate turn of events.” She wanted to wring her hands, but balled them into fists and began to pace instead. “Regarding my husband.”

Six steps carried her to the side window and a rectangular Wardian case, teaming with small green ferns. She placed two gloved fingers, tentatively, on one of the case’s panes, staring at the imprisoned plants. Under her fingers, on the other side of the cool transparent surface, a spiky plant pushed its fronds against the glass, looking as panicked and trapped as she felt.

Gazing at the fern, Inez continued, “Mr. Stannert returned today. Out of a clear blue sky.” She gestured toward the window, as if Mark might suddenly plummet down through the narrow gap between the two houses like an ill-timed meteorite.

“He’s in town.” She did an about-face. “It’s insane!” she exploded. “Why now? More than a year, without a word, and then, just as I am about to be quit of him, he shows up?”

Casey still stood, observing her over the top of his glasses. He leaned over his desk with his fingertips resting on the surface as if it were a piano keyboard.

She added, “He seems to think we shall simply continue as we were before. As if his absence were nothing at all, as if he were never gone.”

“Mrs. Stannert,” he said. “Please, sit. We must work this through together.” The gravity in his tone made her want to bolt. But there was no place to run.

She returned to the chair and sank into it. “Whatever shall I do?” she whispered. Then, she raised her voice. “This changes nothing. I still want a divorce.”

He settled into his own chair, opposite. “Pardon me, Mrs. Stannert. But I must disagree. This changes a great deal.”

She spoke her deepest fear. “Can he force me to stay married to him?”

The lawyer tipped his head to one side and then the other, neither yes nor no. “He was gone for the allotted time to prosecute for desertion. Laches is still a sound legal principle,” Casey allowed. “Furthermore, am I correct that in that space of time he did not provide any support? Sent no monies?”

She purposely relaxed her clenched hands. “In the intervening time, there was no word from him, and certainly no funds.”

He did another noncommittal head wag, and added, “Failure by husband to provide for wife for the period of one year entitles her to a divorce. But there is absolutely no guarantee. The exact wording stipulates a failure to make reasonable provision for the support of the family. One could argue
res ipsa loquitor
, the thing speaks for itself, that a husband who left a wife with a healthy bank account, a going business, a domicile and so on, did indeed support his wife, and that such provisions were made possible by the fruits of his labors. It’s an approach I might take, should I be opposing counsel.” His gaze sharpened. “Has he said what caused his absence? Where he has been in the interim?”

“No.” She sank back into the leather seat, which sighed beneath her. “He wants to explain, but I would have none of it. The man lies as easily as you or I breathe. I would not trust a word he says.” She raised her voice. “Surely, surely, he can’t force me to stay married to him against my will. Can he?”

“The law is complicated in that regard.” Casey looked out the window for a moment, then removed his glasses and looked back at Inez. Something had changed in his expression in that brief glance away. He was, she sensed, more distant.

“It is good that you came by, Mrs. Stannert. We need to talk, so now is as good a time as any.” He folded his glasses, set them carefully to the right on a pad of legal paper, then laced his hands together and placed them in the exact center of the desk. “Mrs. Stannert, you have not been entirely truthful with me.”

She reared back in her chair. “How dare you!” Even as she said the words with proper indignation, her thoughts skittered about, like birds trapped inside a room. She thought of the half-truths, the omissions, the outright falsehoods that had, somehow, tripped so easily off her tongue in their earlier conversations, back when she was certain Mark was dead, or at least good and gone.

“You have prevaricated not just once, but multiple times,” he continued, as if she hadn’t protested. “I grant you, spouses seeking divorce will often embroider a story. Bend the truth. Omit certain acts, events, and so on. As long as your husband was not in evidence, well, there was no one to demand an accounting, so I was willing to look the other way, in view of your evident distress and obvious wishes to proceed apace. Not a wise decision on my part, I suppose.” He compressed his lips.

Inez sputtered. “I came to you, Mr. Casey, because you were well recommended. I am willing to pay whatever is needed to dissolve this sham of a marriage.”

“Mrs. Stannert, if you want me to represent you, I promise I will do my best to get you a fair share of the property. I will do my best to gain you custody of your son. But I cannot do my job if you are not completely and absolutely honest and open with me. Particularly now.”

She leaned forward in turn, gripping the edge of his desk. “What are you implying? This should be a straightforward matter. He was absent for more than a year. I want a divorce. How difficult can it be to get one, here in Leadville? I recall hearing about Elizabeth Johnson here in town. She divorced Mr. Johnson, married his brother a few months later, divorced him, and remarried the first Mr. Johnson, all in the space of a year.”

Casey closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. Inez had the sense that he was holding his breath, perhaps even counting to ten. He finally said, with a sigh, “A vastly different case, Mrs. Stannert.”

His hand went from nose to pocket, absently patted it, then wandered to the desk, finally coming to grips with his folded glasses. He settled them back on before directing his gaze and comments to her. “Were there children involved? Or sizable material holdings? Did either Mr. Johnson put up a fight against the charges filed? I assure you, the answer to the aforementioned questions is a resounding ‘no.’ Finally, do you truly want to compare yourself, put yourself at the same social footing as the aforesaid Mrs. Johnson, whose matrimonial miscalculations and missteps provided casual amusement for the elbow-benders lining the brass rails in town?”

“Of course not,” snapped Inez.

“Then do not use her as an argument.” Casey broke eye contact and picked up a pencil that lay to the left side of his blotter and transferred it to the right. He regarded it thoughtfully, then asked, “Do you indulge in checkers, whist, card games, the like?”

“On occasion,” said Inez, wary of the change in conversation. “Why?”

“Any successful player of the gaming arts knows that it is important to think like the opponent, if one hopes to win. That is, if the game is one of skill and not simply luck. It is the same in the practice of the law. To succeed, one must think like the judge and the opposing counsel, know where his mind may lead, determine what paths are the ones of least resistance—that is, most likely to be taken in the case of an opponent who is either lazy or thinks to make an ‘easy game’ of it. It is also important to work out the more convoluted responses and tricks and snares that might be employed by an opponent determined to win at all costs. Everything is made easier by knowing the opponent, his strengths, weaknesses, and history.”

“I told you, I know my husband. He clearly wants to patch things up and keep our marriage intact. I guarantee, he will be opposed to a divorce.”

Casey picked up the pencil, and moved it back to its original position. “Mr. Stannert is not the opponent. I am talking about the opposing counsel, who will present the argument against our petition to divorce.”

Casey leaned back, gazing at a spot over Inez’s head. “I can think of three or four lawyers who would be more than happy to take up your husband’s case. We shall see whom he chooses, assuming he takes that course and does not accede to our demands. But I will give you a taste of what may be facing us, should an agreement not be possible. I won’t sugar the pill, Mrs. Stannert. This has the earmarks of a public spectacle, so you must prepare yourself for that possibility. We will be in a courtroom, facing a judge and a jury of peers.”

“I…I thought,” she stammered, “I thought you said it would be a more private proceeding.”

“That was assuming the defendant would not be present. If, as you suggest, he appears and denies the alleged charges in our bill, the case shall be tried by a jury. A jury of men, much like your husband—businessmen, husbands, Leadville men of means. No doubt men who know both of you, or know of you.”

Inez had a horrifying vision of a jury box populated with right-thinking men from her church, well-heeled customers of the Silver Queen, and local capitalists and entrepreneurs. Her blood ran as cold as ice water.

Casey continued. “Any jurist worth his salt will look to build a bridge to those men. Build sympathy for your husband’s plight. Should I be representing a husband who was against the dissolution of his marriage, I would start by looking for someone to pin the responsibility on for the estrangement of affection of the
femme-covert
,” his gaze switched to Inez, “the wife, that is.
Exempli gratia,
” he began to twist idly to and fro in his chair, the spring squeaking like a tortured canary, “In an evil hour,” he intoned, “a black shadow crept near, entwined around her and instilled into her breast the seeds of a discontent that he hoped would ripen into an alienation from her husband, and dissatisfaction with her lot in life.”

Inez stared, feeling a guilty flush crawl up her face.
Could he be referring to my liaison with Reverend Sands?

Casey glanced at Inez and said conversationally, “Never mind that, in this case, the husband has absented himself from hearth and home for many months. The point would be to feed into the fear that dwells in the heart of every married man or any man who hopes to someday marry. Yes, the lawyer for your husband would do well to paint you a weak woman, a woman who is easily influenced and led astray from matrimonial duties and convictions, but whom the husband hopes to reclaim with a firm and God-given right, to lead her back to wifely virtues and responsibilities.”

Inez couldn’t help it. She snorted in derision. “There are few I can think of who would believe me a weak woman,” she said. “As for those wifely virtues and responsibilities, what about a husband’s? Shouldn’t he have been here for me? If there is to be blame, who has the greater share?”

He raised a hand and pointing upward said, as if speaking to a larger audience, “That man was made for God, and woman for man; and that the woman was the weaker vessel, is meant to be under the protection of the stronger vessel, man. The forfeiture of that supremacy is as much an infraction of the husband’s right as though it was the infliction of violence upon her or him.”