The Address, page 24
Nellie arrived an hour later, followed by waitstaff carrying trays of breakfast food for them, more than either would be able to eat. Potato omelettes, egg toast, biscuits. Sara’s eyes welled up at the gluttony laid out on the table.
“Don’t cry, please don’t cry.” Nellie sat back. “I need you to toughen up. We’ll take advantage of your fame and this will all be behind you before you know it.”
“I can’t imagine I’ll ever forget Blackwell’s. What I saw there.” For the first time, it dawned on her what a risk Nellie had taken by being voluntarily admitted. “Why did you do it? Did you know what you were getting into?”
Nellie spooned some jam onto a triangle of toast. “Not really. I’d heard rumors. But I’m not one to report on tea parties or the latest gowns from Paris. My editors know that, and I knew they would protect me.”
“Still. What if you’d been lost, like I was?”
“I was more valuable to my editors on the outside, exposing what was going on. They wouldn’t have dared leave me behind.”
“I envy you, in control of your own life.” Sara shook her head. “I thought I was doing the same, but look what happened.”
“It wasn’t your fault. Remember that and stay strong. You have a lot of decisions to make.” Nellie poured her some coffee and insisted she eat a hard-boiled egg. Sara did as she was told, luxuriating in the slipperiness of the egg white in contrast to the chalky yolk on her tongue. As good as caviar.
She knew what she wanted to do first off. “I’ll need to speak with Mr. Camden.”
“Right. He wants you to come to his offices.”
“Hardenbergh’s office?”
“He gave me the address. I’ll bring you there.”
Nellie expertly extracted them from the hotel out the back door, avoiding the wolf pack of journalists, and into a waiting hack. They pulled up in front of a building on Madison Avenue in the Forties. “He said it’s on the second floor. I’ll stay in the carriage.”
Sara welcomed the darkness of the stairway and didn’t pass another soul before arriving at the door marked THEO. CAMDEN, ARCHITECT.
He’d gone into business for himself.
She turned the doorknob and found herself standing in a large room that contained an empty desk and a leather armchair. An open door on the far wall led to a smaller office. Theo came flying toward her before she could even register who he was.
“Sara, you’re free.”
If she had any qualms about how they ought to greet each other after so long apart, she had no time to question what to do, as he pulled her to him and held her close.
Her entire body erupted in convulsive sobs. He stroked her hair and spoke words that soothed, but it was no good. She’d dreamed of this moment for so long. All of the pain and anguish poured out of her. But even more, she cried because he hadn’t forgotten her after all.
He reached into his pocket and handed her his handkerchief.
“Come into my office.” He led her to a settee opposite a large desk covered with drawings, never letting go of her hands. “My God, what you’ve been through. If I’d only known. When I spoke with Mr. Douglas, he said he’d offered you the opportunity to return home, and you left on the next ship back to England. I hoped you might send me a letter, but when none came, I figured you were done with New York. Done with me.”
“Mr. Douglas lied. He locked me away so that the scandal wouldn’t taint the Dakota.”
“You’ve suffered so much. I read the papers, what you went through.”
She looked away. No one on the outside could truly understand. “I have friends there who need help. Like me, they were locked away for no reason at all.”
“The mayor and the commission are looking into it; there’s been a huge outcry. That reporter has single-handedly changed the course of events.”
“Nellie. She saved me.”
Theo shook his head. “It should have been me. I should have been the one who saved you.”
“No. You couldn’t have known.”
“Are you all right? Now, I mean? Did they hurt you?”
She thought of the baby. To have felt it grow in her womb and then have nothing left, nothing in her arms, was the worst pain she’d ever experienced. Her body shook.
“Are you cold?”
“No. I’m fine. Better now.”
She’d never tell him about the child.
Theo’s face darkened. “Mrs. Camden is terribly sorry that you were falsely accused. She wanted to apologize in person, but I’m afraid she’s taken ill. The doctor says it’s bilious fever, and recommended she go upstate to recover and rest. Away from the city. The children are with her.”
“I see.” Sara couldn’t shake the idea that she’d been behind the scheme, in some way.
“As soon as I saw the article, I knew I had to find you.”
“It consoles me to think that you cared enough to think about me while I was away, to wonder.”
“Of course. I’d go up on the roof of the Dakota and stare across the park, hoping to see someone with your gait, your coloring, that you might return one day.”
“To think I was on Blackwell’s Island the whole time, staring into the distance at the outline of the Dakota. You can see it from there, did you know?”
“We were looking at each other but didn’t know it.”
How she’d missed him. She looked away, intoxicated at being so near to him after all this time, but embarrassed, too. “Sadly, yes.” She forced a laugh. “But I’m out. Now I have to figure out what to do. I don’t like being the center of attention.”
“It will work in your favor, you know. The new agent at the Dakota is intent on hiring you back, to show the rest of the city that you have been absolved.”
“Who is in charge now?”
“Mrs. Haines.”
“Best to keep it that way. I’m sure she’s doing a lovely job.”
“She doesn’t have many friends, if that’s what you mean.”
Daisy’s jolly “hello” each morning, her way of making the most arduous tasks seem enjoyable, came to mind. They had made a good team. “What about Daisy?”
Theo frowned. “She’s been put away for good. At Blackwell’s Island women’s prison, strangely enough.”
“How do we know Daisy wasn’t set up by Mr. Douglas, too? She wasn’t one to steal anything. I knew her well.”
“Are you sure?” His expression was guarded. There was something he wasn’t telling her.
“What do you mean?”
“Mrs. Haines told us that a couple of months after Daisy’s run-in with the intruder, she saw her walking with the same man in Central Park.”
Sara thought about it. The night that Daisy had been attacked, something had seemed off. The man’s lack of urgency when he was discovered, to begin with. The way Daisy avoided Sara’s gaze. She knew him, had invited him to her room, then pretended to have been attacked when he’d got caught. Sara and Mrs. Haines had come running to her defense as if she were a damsel in distress. Sara wondered what else she’d gotten wrong, what else Daisy had been up to.
“Why didn’t Mrs. Haines tell anyone?”
“Daisy’s mother died soon after, so she decided to put off confronting her until after the holidays. And then”—he paused—“well.”
Right. Then everything had come tumbling down. “Daisy had to support a large family; maybe that’s why she stole. Shouldn’t that be taken into account?”
Theo rubbed his brow. “After everything you’ve been through, you’re worried about Daisy?”
He was right. If it were true, and everyone seemed to be convinced of it, then Daisy had taken advantage of Sara’s trust and vulnerability.
She stood and looked about the room. “You’ve done well for yourself.”
“I thought it was time for me to stand on my own two feet. More importantly, Hardenbergh finally came through.”
“When did you set up shop?”
“A few months ago. I’m afraid clients aren’t exactly breaking down my door.” He shook his head. “But I refuse to do more of the same. I want to create buildings for the coming century, not this one. Here, look at my ideas.”
He grabbed a sketchbook from his desk and handed it to her. She leafed through the pages, unsettled by the feel of him standing so close beside her.
“This one is quite lovely.”
“A library.” He drew his finger along the roofline. “Any ornamentation is also structural. Like these pillars.” Another turn of the page. “Here is an office building for the city. Made out of concrete. The smooth surface draws the eye upward, into the sky.”
“It is breathtaking.”
“The city would be transformed. It’s a completely different way of looking at the world.” He looked down at her. “I knew you’d understand. I imagine block after block of these, each with their own personality but not fighting each other the way the big mansions do now along Fifth Avenue.”
He sat beside her, no longer looking down at the pages. “If you won’t go back to the Dakota to work, would you work for me? As my office manager? Or managerette? Whatever you want to call it. Granted, there’s not a lot to do right now, but together we’ll make it all work out. I need you beside me, you see.”
A lump lodged in her chest. “I couldn’t do that. It would attract too much attention.”
“I don’t care about that. In fact, I could use the attention.”
“It wouldn’t be right. What about Mrs. Camden?”
“She felt terrible when the truth came out. She has a larger perspective on what is important. To her, it’s the children. To me, it’s my work. You see, we have never been very happy together. We’ve reached an understanding, you might say.”
“She doesn’t know about me, about us?”
“No. Of course not.”
Sara considered her choices. She could take over Mrs. Haines’s job at the Dakota, but that would be a step backward. Working with Theo on his new projects would be fulfilling. And dangerous.
“We couldn’t ever do what we did that one night.” Her boldness made her turn red, and the heat crawled up the back of her neck.
He looked away. “Of course not. I understand that. But we’d work together well, don’t you think?”
She didn’t respond.
“What about this? What if I got you an apartment at the Dakota? There’s one on the sixth floor that’s vacant, as the tenants both passed away last month.”
“The Rembrandts?” Sara remembered them. A much older couple, devoted to each other, who had taken the adventurous step to move uptown. She was sorry to hear they had died.
“Yes. Once the press gets used to the idea that you are free and taken care of, living in the Dakota and working for me, we’d be able to go on with our lives. It’s an opportunity seized from a tragedy.”
“I can’t imagine living in the Dakota again. It would feel so strange.”
“But you must. They’ll let you live there for a year rent-free. I will insist.”
“You would?”
“Of course. It is the right thing to do. Please say yes, Sara.”
She’d come to America to do better, to improve her lot, and she had been betrayed and abused. But instead of giving in, she’d figured out how to survive under the most atrocious circumstances. Now she would get to work alongside the man she adored, live in a beautiful building befitting an earl’s daughter, and no longer be in service.
An opportunity seized from a tragedy.
His words echoed in her ears.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
New York City, September 1985
Theodore Camden’s murder, not surprisingly, had made big news back in 1885. The most sensational articles Bailey found were in the New York World. One stated that Sara Smythe had been incarcerated earlier that year at Blackwell’s Island Insane Asylum and released due to the intervention of a female journalist, Nellie Bly. After Sara got out, she’d been hired as an assistant to Theodore Camden before savagely turning on him and stabbing him in the library of his Dakota apartment.
Bailey spent hours at the public library, reading through Nellie Bly’s accounts of her time at the asylum, which was located right across the East River on what was now known as Roosevelt Island. The graphic descriptions turned her stomach. As did the fact that alcoholics were often locked away in the workhouse on the island. How lucky she’d been to be born a hundred years later.
Sara Smythe, who might very well be her great-grandmother, had been through a terrible ordeal. After all that, Christopher had never received the letter from her confirming that she was indeed his mother. Minnie had hidden it away from him. The injustice of it all left a sour taste in Bailey’s mouth.
But Renzo’s warning stayed with Bailey. Maybe the letter was from Minnie. After all, it was found in her purse. The whole thing made Bailey’s head buzz with confusion. Still, no matter who his mother was, Christopher’s father was Theodore Camden. The letter was proof, proof that Melinda wouldn’t be able to deny.
Melinda had always been vague about the amount of money in her trust fund. But surely, there would be enough for both lines of the family to split the principal and still live well. Bailey would be able to put a security deposit down on a rental apartment and maybe even pay back Tristan for the cost of Silver Hill. The luxury of a financial cushion to break her fall.
Her cousin’s brittle voice rang out as soon as she entered the Dakota apartment. “Where the hell have you been?”
Melinda stood against the library windowpane, smoking a cigarette.
“You really shouldn’t smoke in here.” Bailey had spent longer than she’d meant to at the library, and the doorman had warned her Melinda was upstairs. “It’s a fire hazard, with all the work going on.”
Melinda inhaled again, her mouth forming a perfect pout. “It’s fine. Why aren’t the bamboo poles up yet?”
“Because I have to order them. It’s not like you can go into the bamboo store and just buy them. These things take time.” She studied Melinda closely. “What’s going on with you?”
“I’m hungry and I’ve been waiting for you when I’m supposed to meet Tony for lunch.”
“Okay.” Bailey spoke as if Melinda were a two-year-old on the cusp of a major meltdown. “What can I do for you, then?”
“I’m not sure about the koi pond anymore.”
Thank God, she’d seen the light. “That’s fine. I think we can find a way to incorporate a really cool aquarium, if you need fish.”
A drilling noise threatened to bring down the walls. Melinda shouted above it. “But I don’t want anything that looks like it belongs in the room of a disgruntled teenager. I want something that’s grown up.”
Bailey shouted back. “Of course. Let me work on it.” This was ridiculous. “Hey, I found something out that is amazing. I want to tell you about it. Can we talk outside?”
“I’m late. You can come to lunch with me, though.”
They met Tony at a bistro on Columbus. He was already seated and halfway through a martini. Once they’d ordered, Bailey dove in.
“I found something down in the basement of the Dakota. Something valuable.”
Tony swiveled his head back from watching their young French waitress sashay to the kitchen. “What might that be, a diamond tiara of Melinda’s mum’s?”
“I wish.” Melinda turned to Tony. “No, she’s found some silly photo. Bailey’s been digging around in the family business, trying to stir up trouble.”
She had expected Melinda’s resistance, and pressed on. “Down in the basement, there are three trunks. One belongs to Theodore Camden, one to his wife, Minnie, and one to the person who brutally stabbed him to death, Sara Smythe.”
Tony perked up. She hadn’t meant to be so dramatic, but she hated the way he had dismissed her. Melinda, on the other hand, rolled her eyes.
Bailey ignored her. “In one of the trunks, I found a letter, most likely from Sara Smythe, that was written to the ward of Theodore and Minnie. It says that the ward, who was my grandfather, was her son. Hers and Theodore’s.”
She waited a moment, to let Tony wrap his head around the various branches of the family tree.
Tony squinted. “Back up. Who’s who? How many generations are you going back?”
“Four, if you can believe it. Theodore Camden had Luther Camden, who had Melinda and Manvel’s father. So Theodore Camden is Melinda and Manvel’s great-grandfather. What I’m suggesting is that Theodore Camden and this woman, Sara Smythe, had Christopher Camden, who’s my grandfather.”
“That means . . .” Tony trailed off.
“That I might also be Theodore’s great-granddaughter.”
“Jesus, you’ve got to stop this; you can’t tell anything by old letters. Let it go, already.” Melinda lit another cigarette. “Tony, I was thinking it’d be fun to go up to Saranac, see the leaves changing. Don’t you think? We could do a weekend, just the two of us.”
“Hold on, I want to hear more.” Tony held up his hand. “Do you have the letter?”
Bailey took an envelope from her handbag and opened it up. She pulled out the letter and laid it on the table, smoothing it out with care.
Tony studied it and looked at Bailey. “It’s hard to tell what the signature is. It’s all blurry. Where was it found?”
“In a purse in Minnie’s trunk. But it’s obviously the word Sara. Look, here’s the S.
“Huh.” He didn’t seem convinced. “If it was written by her, how can you believe it? She obviously was a nutjob.”
He had a point.
Melinda balanced her cigarette in the ashtray, perilously close to the letter. “You said you found something valuable. This is a piece of paper. I don’t get it.”
Bailey folded it back up and put it in the envelope. “There’s something else. Did you see the article in the paper about how they had to stop the work at Strawberry Fields because they found an antique knife?”
