Sweet Mercy (25 page)

“Link!”

For a moment, he didn't move. Then, in long strides, taking the stairs two at a time, he hurried to my side. He raised a hand to my face, as though to see if I were real.

“Are you all right?” he asked.

I nodded. “Yes.” A tear slipped down my cheek. He wiped it away with his thumb.

“You told me you wouldn't be here.”

My heart was still racing and my words came out in a trembling rush. “The girls were sick. We couldn't leave.”

“Is everyone all right?”

I looked down the hall. I didn't know where Cassandra and Warren were, or the girls. They weren't among the crowd now
moving about more freely and chattering among themselves. “I think so,” I answered.

I looked back at Link, first at the badge pinned to his breast pocket, and then directly into his eyes. “You told me you were a bum,” I said. “But you're not. You're a Prohibition agent.”

A smile began to play about his lips. “Bum. Prohibition agent.” He shrugged. “Most people consider them the same thing.”

For the first time since Grace had awakened, I smiled. “You've been undercover all this time?”

“Yes.”

“And you were just posing as one of the men at the camp?”

“That's right. I was sent over from Cincinnati where we've been working to shut down a huge bootlegging ring for a while. We knew the booze was being distributed through transport stations throughout the state, like your uncle's lodge.”

“They arrested Uncle Cy and my cousin Jones.”

“I'm afraid so. Along with others. Including the big guy himself.”

“The big guy?”

“The owner of the whole operation.”

“Who's that?”

“George Treadwell. You may know him as George Sluder.”

Stunned, I shook my head at the thought. “Yes, I know who he is. They arrested his wife too.”

Link nodded. “Sure. She's an accessory.”

“You knew all that?”

“Eventually we did.”

“But . . .”

“But what, Eve?”

“You knew about the lodge?”

“We found out.”

“How?”

Link glanced away. “It doesn't matter.”

“But—”

He laid a finger to my lips to quiet me. “Listen, Eve, your uncle's probably going to be gone for a while. You understand that, don't you?”

I thought a moment, then nodded. “Uncle Cy is going to prison, isn't he?”

“I'm afraid so, yes. So . . .” He paused and cleared his throat. “So he won't be around to run the lodge, and that being the case, I'm wondering, do you think your father might take over and, well, you know, you'd all end up staying here?”

I frowned at that. “I don't know,” I said truthfully. “I have no idea what Daddy will want to do now.”

“Okay, well.” Link paused and looked away a moment. Then he looked back at me and said more forcefully, “I'm going back to my original plan. If you stay, I'm going to ask your father if I can call on you. And don't you say no, all right?”

I offered him a tentative smile. “But what if we leave?”

“In that case, I'll have to follow you. I'm in the market for a new job anyway.”

“You are?”

“As of tonight, I am. A man can get himself killed going after bootleggers. We can't have that happening now, can we?”

“No,” I agreed. “We can't have that happening.”

He reached for the badge on his breast pocket and unpinned it. “From now on, I'm plain old Charles Hoppe.”

“Charles Hoppe?”

“My real name. Charles Lincoln Hoppe. I needed a cover so I decided to go by Link.”

I laughed lightly. “I will have to get used to calling you Charles.”

“I hope so,” he said.

“Hoppe!” A uniformed figure hollered up from the front door.

“Here, sir!” Link answered.

“You're needed outside.”

“Be right there.”

The officer left. Link turned back to me. Taking my hand, he gently uncurled my fingers and laid the badge in my palm. “Someday, I'll trade this for a ring.”

I looked at the badge and blinked back tears. “You sound pretty sure of yourself,” I whispered.

“I am. Will you wait for me?”

I nodded. “Yes, I'll wait.”

He kissed me then, a brief and tender kiss that shattered all my fears. For the first time in a very long time, I felt safe. He gave me one last smile and hurried down the stairs into what was left of that dark and beautiful night. I lifted the badge to my heart and watched him go.

M
AY
1981

T
he words are a tarnished gold against a fading blue: “U.S. Prohibition Service—Treasury Department.” It somehow seems smaller than I remembered, nestled there in the center of my palm. Maybe it's because the skin of my hand is loose and wrinkled now, the knuckles enlarged. Deep in memory, I stare at the badge until my grandson interrupts my thoughts.

“Did he ever give you the ring, Grandma?”

I look up, startled. “What? Oh yes, of course.” I lift my left hand for him to see the wedding band. “I've worn it for forty-six years now.”

Sean lets out a small whistle. “That's a long time.”

“Yes, it is,” I agree. “A good long time.”

I tuck the badge back into the wooden box that lies open on my lap. “Thank you for finding my box for me.”

“Sure, Grandma.” Sean claps his hands together as though to rid them of dust, then wipes his palms on his shorts. “How come you never told me before about Grandpa being a federal agent?”

I think about that, then shake my head. “I don't know, Sean. I guess because it meant telling you all the family secrets.”

He looks around at the cluttered attic, at the boxes in disarray that we had just dug through. To him, we had been sorting through junk. For me, we had been resurrecting the dead.

Sean sniffs, sneezes, and then sits down on a box beside me. “So what happened to Uncle Cy and everyone?”

“Well . . .” I take a deep breath. “Uncle Cy went to prison. He did five years in the Ohio State Penitentiary.”

Another low whistle. “I bet he sighed about that.”

I glance at Sean and chuckle. “I well imagine he did, a time or two.”

“And then what? Did he come back here?”

“No, he never came back. Once he got out he just kind of disappeared. I guess he figured it was dangerous to come back.”

“Dangerous?”

“Well, he probably assumed George Sluder—or Treadwell, rather—would seek revenge for what had happened. But by then, there was probably nothing to worry about. Old George was still in prison when Uncle Cy got out. George did seven years, the last one in Alcatraz. By the time he was released, he was a broken man. Sick in body and soul. He lived only about another year after that. I heard he died almost penniless.”

“Really?”

“That's the story, anyway. Prohibition was long over by then, and he had no way to make a living.”

“What about his wife?”

I lift my shoulders in a shrug. “I'm not really sure what happened to her. She somehow avoided prison, but what became of her, I don't know.”

“Maybe she found another rich man to marry.”

“Maybe. Yes, probably. Marrying rich men was most likely her vocation. Some women are just born to that.”

The late afternoon sun slants in through the attic windows. Dust dances like dandelion seeds in its rays. Sean sneezes again.

“Bless you,” I say. “Do you want to leave now?”

He shakes his head adamantly. “I want to know what else happened.”

“Like what?”

“Like, what happened to Jones? Did he go to prison too?”

“Jones.” I smile at the name. “No, he didn't. Jones, like Uncle Cy, simply disappeared. Except that he disappeared on the night of the raid. No one ever saw him again after that night.”

“How'd he do that?” My grandson's eyes grow wide as nickels.

“He had a little help,” I say as I pull the St. Rita medal out of the box.

“The saints helped him escape?” Sean asks incredulously.

I laugh. “No, not the saints. The feds.”

“The feds?”

“Yes. Jones was the informant. He gave it all away. At first I didn't know that, but your grandfather finally told me all
about it. After his mother died, Jones really had no reason to stay on at the lodge. He was ready to go after his dream. So he made a deal with the feds. The information they were looking for in exchange for safe passage out of the States.”

“Really? Where'd he go?”

“He went to the Alaskan Territory, just as he'd hoped. Back then, Alaska wasn't a state. It was the ends of the earth, as far as we were concerned. I think Jones figured he could go there and be safe and simply live a normal life, or at least a different life from the one he was living here.”

“But are you sure he got there?”

“Oh yes, I'm sure. Some years after the raid I received a package from Alaska. There was no return address and no name inside, but I knew it was from Jones.”

“How?”

I look at the medal in my hand once more. “It was another medal. This one was for St. Zachary.”

“Who?”

I smile at Sean. “St. Zachary. The patron saint of peace.”

He returns my smile. “So maybe Jones was happy.”

“I think so.”

“Maybe he married an Eskimo woman and had a bunch of Eskimo kids.”

“Maybe. I hope so. At any rate, I knew he was all right.”

“It was nice of him to let you know.”

“Yes, Sean, it was.”

“And what about your friend Marlene? Did you really never see her again?”

“No, I never did, though we stayed in touch for many years. She and Jimmy made their way to California, where they eventually settled and had six kids.”

“Six kids!”

I nod. “They named their youngest daughter Eve, which I always thought was nice. We eventually lost contact, though. Kind of a shame, but life gets busy when you're raising a family.”

We sit quietly a moment. Then Sean says, “So after the raid, that's when you took over the lodge.”

“Well, not me exactly. Daddy and Mother took over. They became part owners with Uncle Luther. Finally Daddy had something he felt he could be proud of. He did a fine job of running the lodge. And as you know, your grandfather Charles came to work for us while he went to college in Cincinnati part-time. Eventually, as you also know, he went on to seminary and became a pastor.”

“And you finished high school.”

“Yes.”

“And never went to college.”

I shake my head. “No, I never did.”

“Why not?”

“Once I got engaged, my dream changed. I was content to become a pastor's wife.”

“I think that's a good thing to be, Grandma.”

“So do I.” I touch my wedding ring briefly. “I stayed here at the lodge and worked until your grandfather Charles and I got married. Then we made a home of our own and started having children. Your uncle Charlie first, then your daddy, and then lastly your aunt Sarah. With your grandpa in the ministry we moved those poor kids around a lot, but we finally settled in Illinois, where we've been the last twenty-some years. Anyway, when I became a bride and moved out of the lodge, I left some of my things here, including this
box, and it eventually ended up in the attic. That's what brought us here today.”

Sean smiles at me, but then his face shifts into a frown. He looks around the attic and shivers in spite of the heat. Quietly, he says, “What about the stories of the lodge being haunted? You know, by the ghosts of all those people killed here that night?”

I chuckle. “We don't believe in ghosts, Sean. You know that. Though people seem to be amused at the thought of places being haunted. Daddy always played it down, but Uncle Luther said the stories were good for business. Those rumors started up right after the raid, of course. Five people shot to death in one night—that's some good fodder for all sorts of stories. Only the brave dared sleep in the suite after that night, since George's two bodyguards were shot to death in the front room while George and Ada were asleep in the back bedroom.”

“I don't guess they were asleep for long after that, were they, Grandma?”

“No, not very long. They had a rather rude awakening that night, I'm afraid.”

“And then that night clerk, Thomas—he was killed, right?”

“That's right.”

“And then the other guy—the one that Grandpa closed his eyes.”

“Yes, he was a Prohibition agent out of Cincinnati who'd come to take part in the raid.”

Sean wiggles his fingers, counting. “Who was the fifth?”

“The fifth was Mr. Adele, if that was his real name. He was the man who used to come to the lodge by himself that summer. I always felt sorry for him because he was alone.
It turns out he was simply one of the armed guards George Treadwell had watching the lodge. There were all sorts of men keeping an eye on things, men I was hardly aware of, watching the lodge and the gas station both. And the tunnel. There were two men watching the tunnel on the night of the raid, and they were both arrested.”

“But what happened to Mr. Adele?”

“Oh, he was in the sitting room when the raid started. I guess he'd pulled night watch that night because he was armed and apparently awake. When the police swarmed in, Mr. Adele fired the first shot. He was killed right away. After that, we had to replace the couch in the sitting room because that was where he landed. There was just no getting the bloodstains out of it.”

“Wow! And what about all the bullet holes?”

“Bullet holes?”

“Yeah, didn't some of the walls get shot up?”

“Yes, well, we fixed most of those, though we left a couple in the suite. Kind of a memento, I guess. Now that I think of it, it seems a funny thing to do. But like the ghost stories, those bullet holes drew business. People liked to come to the lodge just to see those holes and the room where George Treadwell and his wife were arrested.”

“I'd like to see the bullet holes myself!”

“All right.” I nod. “You can see them on the way out.”

“Okay. But there's one more thing I want to see first.”

“And what's that?”

“The elephant from Al Capone.”

“Of course,” I say. “I almost forgot.”

“You can't forget that, Grandma.”

“No, you're right. I must never forget.”

I lift the little ivory elephant out of the box and hand it to Sean.

“Wow!” he exclaims. “I can't believe you got this from Al Capone! Public Enemy Number One!”

I chuckle at his enthusiasm. “Yes, one of the most notorious men in the world. And yet he was kind to a little girl.”

Sean lifts his shoulders nonchalantly. “So maybe he wasn't all bad.”

“No, I'm sure you're right. He wasn't all bad, just as none of us is all good. Though it can be tempting to think of ourselves that way.”

Sean isn't listening. He is turning the elephant over and over in his hands. Our fascination for the notorious never ends.

“I want to tell you something, Sean.”

“Yeah?” He doesn't take his eyes from the little figurine.

“In recent years, I've read some of the books written about Al Capone.”

“Yeah?”

“He was arrested for tax evasion, you know. Not for murder. Not even for bootlegging or for running brothels.”

Sean's brows meet. “Brothels? What's that?”

“Never mind,” I say. “Forget I said that. Anyway, he went to prison and eventually ended up in Alcatraz.”

“Like old George.”

“Yes, like old George.”

“That's where they sent the worst of the worst. That's what Grandpa told me.”

“Yes, it's true. Alcatraz once held the worst of the worst, before the whole prison was shut down. It was a dreadful place.”

“So did he escape?” Sean asks eagerly.

“Oh no, he never escaped. But what I want to tell you is this. One Sunday at Alcatraz a visiting pastor was holding a church service. A large number of the prisoners attended, including Al Capone. Well, when the pastor asked who felt in need of prayer, Capone raised his hand. Then the pastor said that anyone who felt in need of a savior should stand up. Capone stood up.”

“He did?”

“Yes, he did.”

“Do you think he prayed to Jesus?”

“I do. I think he prayed to ask Jesus to forgive him.”

“How come we never hear about that? We only hear about how he killed people and all that.”

“Well.” I take a deep breath. “First of all, it would ruin the whole picture of the tough guy, you know? He's an American icon and we don't want to change his image. On top of that, the people who did know about that Sunday at Alcatraz didn't take it seriously. See, by that time, Capone was already sick with a serious illness that affects the mind. One of his friends said that because of the sickness Al was ‘nutty as a fruitcake.'”

“Oh.” Sean thinks about that for a moment. “Then maybe he really didn't know what he was doing.”

I lean toward him and catch his eye. “But you see, I think he did.”

“You do?”

I nod. “Because it didn't end there. Once he was out of prison, he went to live at his mansion in Florida. He was still sick, of course. He was sick right up to the end of his life a few years later. But when people came to visit him, he
would tell them about how he was sorry for what he'd done in the past. And he told people he'd accepted Jesus as his savior in Alcatraz.”