Witch in the White City: A Dark Historical Fantasy/Mystery (Neva Freeman Book 1) by Nick Wisseman (popular books to read .TXT) 📗

Neva nodded. Details of her connection to him—and his mysterious absence—had come out during the interrogation of Bat. “Yes.”

Brin clucked her tongue. “Good luck. I’d lend a hand, but my shift starts soon. I’ll look for you on the grounds.” She stepped in the direction of the nearest rail station, then paused. “If you’re in earnest about helping with the Wheel, the boys and I are meeting at ten tonight in Machinery.”

Neva considered her fiery-haired counterpart for a moment. “So you trust me now?”

“The others don’t, but I can bring them around. If you’re in earnest.”

It still felt like a fool’s errand, and a dangerous one at that. Moreover, it was a distraction from finding out what had happened to Augie. But Brin was growing on her, and Wiley had been nothing but kind. They deserved the chance to be dissuaded before she did something more drastic. Like going to the authorities.

“I’ll see you at ten,” Neva said.

Brin waved and left.

Neva watched her go and then headed south, taking a quick detour to Halsted Street and Jane Adams’ Hull House, the famed settlement house for recently arrived European immigrants. But Dob was no longer there—as Wiley had hoped, his aunt had picked him up the previous afternoon. Neva thanked the bleary-eyed resident she’d spoken with, begged the use of a washroom to clean herself up, and hurried north. She would have liked to stay longer. Adams and her fellow Progressives offered a range of social programs to the surrounding working-class neighborhood, including free concerts and lectures on all manner of subjects. But there wasn’t time. At least Dob had someone to look after him now.

The DeBells’ house was another two hours’ walk, but Neva didn’t stop once. She just kept stepping out the rest of her worries—and anger, and grief, and guilt—as she picked her way around masses of homeless until the neighborhoods became more affluent.

The DeBells lived in the Gold Coast, a tree-lined paradise along Lake Michigan that had grown up after the Great Fire. Mr. DeBell had followed Potter Palmer’s lead by buying land in the area before it was popular. And while the DeBells’ property wasn’t nearly as majestic as Palmer’s castle-like mansion, Mrs. DeBell still oversaw a bustling three-story household. Several other stockyard executives lived in the area, which smelled immeasurably better than Packingtown (the slums to the southwest of the Stockyards, and home to most of its laborers).

When Neva finally reached the DeBells’, she glanced first at the path to the servant’s entrance and then at the main walkway to the front door. Would either one ever feel right? She’d been here recently—Mr. DeBell had invited her and Augie to visit when they’d returned to Chicago to seek their fortune at the Fair. Still, calling at the front today seemed too formal, even for such a somber reason. So she opted for the servant’s entrance.

It was the right choice: Hatty opened the door, saw her, and smiled.

“Genevieve!” the old woman said in her rich voice. “How I needed a surprise like this. Come in, child, come in.” She stepped back inside and opened her arms for an embrace.

Neva accepted both invitations gladly—Hatty had been a friend of her mother’s and the only servant not to regard Betty Freeman’s offspring as upstarts. “It’s good to see you,” she whispered, pressing her cheek against Hatty’s.

“And you, child. I’ve a few minutes before breakfast is to be served. Would you mind helping me with these?” She pointed to a basket full of napkins in need of folding.

Feeling her lips curving into a small, nostalgic grin, Neva nodded and pulled out a handful of fine white cloth.

Hatty drew out the rest of the napkins and started on the topmost. “You’ve not been by since the Fair began. Is it as heavenly as they say?”

“Most days.” Neva hid her discomfort by attempting to shape a napkin into one of the floral patterns she’d seen Brin manage so effortlessly the night before.

“Don’t crumple them, child—clean lines are all I need.”

She considered her failure of a flower for a moment before smoothing the cloth flat.

“Was there really a fire the other night? And a killing?”

The truth was on the tip of Neva’s tongue, but she sucked back the words before they could escape her lips. Hatty had saved pastries for her and Augie after the house hosted big parties, kept them focused on their lessons (even though she’d never been afforded an education herself), and tucked them in at night.

She couldn’t tell Hatty about Augie—not yet. Not when everything was so ... unresolved. “As it happens, the fire is why I came: to speak with Mr. DeBell about the goings-on. Is he here?”

“No, child.” Hatty shook her head slowly. “No, he’s away. Left for work one morning last week and never came back.”

“So there’s been no word?”

“Not a whisper.”

“That’s not like him.”

“Not of late.”

Neva chewed this over for a moment. “What does that mean?”

Hatty folded the last of her napkins and returned them to the basket. “It’s been years, but he did something like this once ... Before Derek was born.”

“You think he’s run off with another mistress?”

Hatty shrugged.

“But what if something happened to him? What if he’s hurt? Or worse?”

“I pray it’s otherwise, child. But if nothing happened to him, then where is he?”

Neva had no answer to this. Nothing she wanted to contemplate, at least.

“You can leave him a note in the study if you’d like. If he comes back, I’ll see that he gets it.”

“Thank you.” Neva placed her stack of folded—and very flat—napkins in the basket.

“Would you like me to tell Mrs. DeBell you’re here?”

She opened her mouth halfway, but it stuck there, unsure what words to form.

Hatty understood anyway. “Or perhaps I’ll tell her later. Maybe mention that you paid a visit while she was out?”

Neva nodded.

“Well, I’m needed in the dining room. Come during the afternoon next time when it’s less hectic. And stay awhile. It’s been too long.”

“I will,” she said as she