“What? Arrested for drunkenness? For falling on his face into a horse trough?”
“Hope!” T.C. said sternly, and Cay could see that his face was also red—and in exactly the same way as Hope’s. “I really think that—”
“That you could bamboozle Cay into doing what you want her to do without telling her the facts?”
“What did he do?” Cay asked.
“He murdered his wife!” Hope nearly shouted.
“Oh.” Cay was unable to think of anything else to say. Her eyes were so wide she looked like a doll in her beautiful dress. There were three stars covered in diamonds in her hair and they sparkled in the candlelight.
Hope sat down on the chair by the bed and looked at T.C. “Should I tell her or will you?”
“You seem to be set on telling all the gory details so you tell her.”
“You weren’t here,” Hope began, “so you didn’t see all the nasty stories in the newspapers. Alexander Lachlan McDowell came to Charleston three months ago, met the very beautiful and talented Miss Lilith Grey, and married her right away. The day after the wedding, he slit her throat.”
Cay put her hand to her neck in horror.
Hope looked at T.C., who glared back at her. “Have I said anything wrong? Exaggerated anything?”
“Every word is straight out of the newspapers,” T.C. said tightly.
Hope looked back at Cay. “This man Alex was only found out by accident. Someone threw a rock with a note attached to it through the window of Judge Arnold’s bedroom. The note said that Alex McDowell’s new bride was dead and she could be found beside her husband in the suite at the top of the best hotel in town. At first the judge thought it was a horrible joke, but when Dr. Nickerson started pounding on the door, saying he had received the same note, the judge went with him to investigate.” Hope looked at T.C. “Should I go on?”
“Can I stop you?”
Cay looked from one to the other and saw two jaws set in exactly the same way, two pairs of eyes flashing anger in the same way. She imagined how when she got home she and her mother would giggle together over every word, every gesture, of what had gone on tonight. She’d tell her father, too, but she’d have to edit the story carefully and leave out any mention of “jail” and “murder.”
“The judge and the doctor burst in on this Alexander McDowell before it was even daylight, and beside him on the bed was his new wife. She was lying there with her throat cut!”
Again Cay gasped, her hand at her neck.
“I’d be willing to stake my life on it that Mac’s son did not commit the murder,” T.C. said calmly.
“That would be all right but you’re risking Cay’s life, not yours!” Hope shot back at him.
Cay looked from one to the other and wasn’t sure they were ever going to speak to each other again. “So you’re breaking him out of jail and sending him away?”
“That was my plan, except that I was going with him.”
“On another of his long, dangerous treks,” Hope said, her voice still angry. “Where were you planning to go this time?”
“Into the wilds of Florida.”
Hope gave a shiver of revulsion.
All her life, Cay had heard about Uncle T.C.’s travels. H
e’d gone with exploration teams into the far west and seen things no other white man had. He loved plants, seemed to know the Latin names of all of them, and he’d spent three years learning to draw what he saw. However, while others praised his drawings, Cay and her mother had kept their opinions to themselves, for they shared a talent for art and they found his paintings too simple, too unschooled. One of Cay’s drawing masters—she’d had them since she was four—had been the English artist Russell Johns. The man was a tyrant in the studio, and Cay’d had to work hard to keep up with his demands, but she’d done it. “If only you were a boy,” he’d said to her many times, his voice wistful.
Cay didn’t realize she’d said the words aloud until she saw T.C. and Hope staring at her. “I was thinking about—”
“Mr. Johns,” T.C. said. “Your latest teacher.” He was looking at her with envy. “How I wish I had your talent, Cay. If I could draw as well and as quickly as you, I’d produce three times as much, and all of it would be good. Foreshortening drives me mad!”
Hope didn’t know much about Cay or her family. Their shared interest was T.C., as he was godfather to both of them. All Hope had been told was that Cay had “a decision to make” and she’d come to stay in Charleston while she made it. “Do you paint?”
T.C. gave a little laugh that sent pain shooting through his body. He rubbed his knee under the bandages while he tried to catch his breath. “Michelangelo would be jealous of her talent.”