The Strange Case of Baby H (12 page)

Mother stared at Clara. “He said that?” She hesitated, then shook her head and resumed walking. “We have come so far already. And our first concern must be for this baby.”

“But, Mother, wait. Father says we'll hide Helen at our house, and she'll be safe until things settle down again and we can take her safely and easily—”

Mother slowed. “He said all that?” Then she snorted. “Longest speech in two years—and I missed it?”

“He did say all that, ma'am,” Edgar piped up. “Indeed, he seemed terribly anxious.”

For a moment, Mother's expression softened. She glanced over at Hattie and Helen. They were a sorry sight, soaked through in the pouring rain. A woman on horseback sloshed past them in the gutter, soiled bundles piled on the horse's back making her look like a disreputable peddler, though she had probably been a respectable housewife only days before.

Other people passed them, heading for the park—even a leaky tent would be better than nothing at all … And then Clara saw out of the corner of her eye two people coming the other way—away from the park, as she herself had come: two men approaching silently up the hill, marching side by side together—then, as they reached the crest, splitting up to walk several yards apart. They might have been soldiers patrolling for looters. They might have been everyday citizens out for a walk in the rain. But as they drew closer, Clara saw their faces set in identical expressions of determination. In fact, the faces were perfectly identical altogether, except for the scar scoring the cheek of the man on the left …

“Run!” she screeched as the men closed in on Hattie and the baby. “It's the kidnappers!”

With a shriek, Hattie turned to flee, but the man with the scar spun her around, knocking her to the ground. Edgar launched himself at the man, kicking him hard in the back as he tried to wrest the baby from Hattie's arms.

“You've betrayed us once too often, Hattie my dear,” Clara heard the man growl. “You've been a very bad girl.”

Baby Helen's wails rose above the sound of the rain. Mother, held around the middle by the other twin, screamed for the police.

As the man with the scar twisted around to punch Edgar, Clara saw her chance. She darted forward and snatched the baby, then started running back down the hill at top speed.

Her skirts swirled around her and the wind slapped rain against her face.
Don't let me fall, don't let me fall
, Clara prayed, hugging Helen to her chest.

Her feet pounded the cracked paving stones. Her heel throbbed with her heartbeat. She headed back toward the streets where the homeless had erected their blanket tents. The kidnappers would not attack with witnesses all around, would they?

She rounded the corner, slowing down as much as she dared so that she would not slip on the slick stones.
Hush, hush
, she whispered to the baby. The baby's cries were a siren in the dusk, announcing their presence. She listened for the sound of footsteps behind her, but heard nothing.

She'd made it! She'd taken the baby and escaped!

Panting now from exertion, Clara slowed her pace. How many more blocks till she would be home? Too many—she'd better start zigzagging through the streets to make it harder for the men to track her. Somehow she would get home—she
had
to!—and somehow they'd hide this baby until the police could be summoned. Surely Mother and Hattie and Edgar would follow.
Oh, please, don't let the kidnappers hurt them …

The rainy street was deserted except for Clara and Baby Helen. And—except for the motorcar chugging down the hill behind them.

Almost home, almost home …

The motorcar stopped. Two figures jumped out. Police? Soldiers? Clara peered through the rain in a panic and realized that
almost home
was not good enough.

The men closed in on her. She fought like a mother seal protecting her pup: bellowing for help, lashing out with her whole body, bending tight to hold little Helen, who howled in terror.

The rain slashed down. “Let go, brat!” snarled a voice in her ear as iron-strong arms pried the baby from her grip.

Clara struggled to hang on to Helen. When she lost the struggle, she clawed at her attackers' faces. “I've seen you!” she screamed at them. “I know your faces! I'll turn you over to the police and you'll be sorry!”

The man who had Helen cursed. “You hear her, Sid?”

“Just take 'em both,” the other man growled over the wailing and the rain. “Just get 'em in the auto and
go
!”

Something coarse and heavy was slapped around Clara's head, something pulled tight, nearly cutting off light and breath. She felt herself being lifted, tossed like a bag of coal into the air … Then a brutal blow, and pain exploding behind her ears …

And darkness.

C
HAPTER
12

O
N THE
R
OCKS

She was struggling to swim. The dark figure below her was tangled in seaweed. She battled the water, her body stiff and slow …

Clara awoke slowly, head groggy, mouth dry and stuffed with something fuzzy. Her body felt heavy, cold and wet. She lay on a gritty surface, roughness under her cheek. She opened her eyes, wincing at the pain that stabbed behind them. She reached up to tug off the strip of cloth that gagged her. It was fabric she recognized as having come from her own skirt. She could see the cornflower pattern in the moonlight.

Yes, it was night. Clara could see now that she was lying on a slab of rock. Darkness surrounded her. She could hear the sound of rain but, strangely, it was not falling on her. She looked up into blackness. There was no sky overhead—just inky rock. She seemed to be inside a sort of cave. She closed her eyes slowly, trying to remember.

She had lost the baby. She had been taken by the kidnappers and left—where? She sniffed. The night air smelled like salt.

Over the patter of the rain she could hear a sound that frightened her almost as much as the kidnappers had because it was so unexpected: the sound of waves breaking on rocks below her.

Moving slowly to keep the dizziness at bay, she inched forward and peered over the edge of the cave. Her head pounded from the blow that had knocked her unconscious, but the sick feeling in her stomach came from the sight before her.

Waves surged among sharp rocks only a few feet below the edge of the cave. She craned her neck around the cave opening, gasping at the pain in her head. To her right, more rock, and the dark rise of hills in the distance. To her left … Clara blinked. Incredibly, she knew this place. She could see the dome of the Sutro Baths.

Clara shivered. The kidnappers had stashed her in a cave in an outcropping of rocks very near Seal Rocks, where Father's steamship had wrecked. Where Gideon had died.

She had not been near this area since the dreadful day after the accident, when she and Mother watched while rescue crews searched for survivors. Now here she was, back again.

Now
she
was a survivor.

The Borden brothers had not killed her, and she was grateful, of course. But she wondered if the kidnappers were stupid men. They hadn't killed her, and they hadn't even tied her up! Yes, she'd been rendered unconscious, but surely the men must realize that as soon as she woke up and climbed out of the cave, she would go for the police!

She gasped in shock as a spray of cold water splashed her face. Struggling, she peered over the edge again. Rain pelted her head. The tide was coming in swiftly and waves were lapping very close to the mouth of the cave. The sharp rocks were covered now by the dark, salty ocean. Soon the cave would be filled—and the kidnappers must have known that. Not stupid after all, then—just evil to the bone.
They mean for me to die out here!
The terrible knowledge that she might not have regained consciousness in time gave Clara new strength. She must escape now—or perish.

Pushing away the dizzy feeling, she scrambled to her knees and slung her feet over the edge of the cave opening. She would have to walk along rocks underwater now until she could climb onto safer ground. She struggled out of the cave, gasping as freezing water closed around her ankles. She clung to the rock face and edged along, carefully feeling her way. The wind blew rain and sea spray into her eyes, and she shook her head, not daring to let go of the rock to wipe her face. Would she ever see Mother and Father again?

Clara!

She froze, listening. The kidnappers? Or someone coming to help her?

Hold on!
the voice cried, and she realized with a shock that the voice pounded inside her own head.
Hold on tight, Old Sock!

“Oh, no, Gideon!” she muttered through teeth clenched against the cold. “I will surely lose my grip if I see a ghost now!—and I don't believe in ghosts anyway!” She wondered if the crack on the head had made her delirious.

The toes of her sodden high-button shoes scrabbled hard against the rock as she climbed out of the water. She grasped knobs of sea-worn rock, found little footholds in hollows. Then she heard another voice—a high-pitched cry coming from up above.
Baby Helen
? Had the men stashed the baby inside another cave, meaning to leave them
both
to drown?

You monsters
, thought Clara furiously. “I'm coming, Helen!” she shouted, peering up into the falling rain. But all she saw were two screeching seagulls glaring down from their roost on the rocks above. They opened their beaks and shrieked at her. Not the baby, then, after all.

At last she reached level ground and rested on the rocks, panting and shivering in the rain. The hulking mass of the Sutro Baths was shrouded in darkness. The huge panels of glass over the domed baths must have shattered in the earthquake. She rounded the building and picked her way cautiously toward higher ground, toward the pathway leading up to Sutro Heights and out to the road. She had to find help.

She had to find Helen.

The rain slackened as she squelched along, shivering in her wet clothing, heading toward the road. In the distance, beyond the baths, she could make out a light. It must come from Cliff House, she decided, which might mean that the imposing building had not been too badly damaged in the earthquake. She knew that it would probably be a long time before people returned to the exhibitions, restaurants, and art galleries at Cliff House, but no matter. There was a light, and that might mean shelter and help on this dreadful night.

Now the rain stopped altogether. Clouds overhead began to part as Clara raced along the path. She moved as quickly as she dared with only the moon lighting her way.
Satchel to Cliff House
. The words echoed in her mind. Had it been the kidnappers' plan all along to bring Helen here? What would Clara find once she reached that lighted room?

She slowed her steps. Cliff House loomed in front of her like a fortress. Were shelter and safety to be found there—or danger?

From the side of the path came a rustling noise. Then a hand shot out from the bushes and grabbed her arm. Clara's scream split through the night and sent gulls screeching overhead in alarm.

“Shh,” hissed a voice at her side. “It's me!” Edgar emerged from the bushes, scratched and dirty and looking more like a ragamuffin than ever by moonlight. But Clara had never been so glad to see anybody in her life and she wrapped her arms around him in a great hug.

“Get off!” he muttered, struggling out of her grip. “Thank goodness you're all right!”

“Where's Helen?” she asked, relief at seeing him turning to dismay as he shook his head.

“
You
had her, last I saw,” he said.

Clara's eyes filled with tears. She blinked them back. “The men knocked me unconscious and left me on the rocks to drown. I escaped, but I didn't see Helen—”

Edgar pulled her off the path. They knelt behind the bushes that formed a screen between them and the palatial Cliff House. “At least
you're
safe,” he said huskily. “That's something.”

“How did you know to look for me here anyway?” she asked, staring at him in confusion.

“I didn't know for sure,” Edgar said in a low voice, “but the paper you'd found with the baby said something about Cliff House. It was the only clue, so I told the police. I
had
to try to find you.” He shifted in the bushes. “I mean, you've been helping me out, so it's only right …”

“You mean the police know we're here?” whispered Clara. “Well, where are they then? We've got to find Helen!”

Edgar sounded puzzled. “I haven't seen anybody—though I was sure they'd be here. Maybe they're still looking after your mother—”

“Mother is hurt?” cried Clara. “Edgar, tell me what happened!”

“Sshh!” He glanced around nervously. “You ran off, and those men knocked your mother to the ground and took off after you. Your mother had a gash on her forehead, and Hattie stayed with her while I ran for the cops. By the time I found one, blood was streaming down your mother's face, but all she could talk about was how you'd rescued the baby and she was so proud of you … It wasn't till the cop found a cart and driver to carry us back to your house that we all realized you and Helen never made it home. Your parents were frantic.”