“If we’re washing clean sheets all over again, then what’s that awful smell?”
“The dead man’s linens, Neda. Can you believe it? I said we should throw them out, but the manager says if we bleach ’em enough times they’ll be good as new. Not me—you’d never catch me sleeping in sheets some old coot died in.”
Matthew flattened himself against the wall and wrinkled his nose against the dreadful smell. Good thing no one had to come out into the hallway to do away with the questionable bundle.
“Well, whatever you think, take it outside, why don’t you? I’m too old to be smellin’ dead people’s things, you sniggering fool.”
“I was just hauling it outside, Neda. If you could see through those eyes of yours, you’d know that. Now stay where you are so you’re out of my way whiles I go past.”
So the laundress had bad eyesight. Matthew would never get another chance like this. He could be in and out with the whip—if she had it—by the time Nicky came back inside. Matthew let his head fall back against the wall. I must be daft. Reaching up, he mussed his hair and rolled his shirtsleeves higher.
“Hey,” he said brightly, raising his voice in pitch and adopting the rusty Southern drawl he’d heard from the woman. “You all found a big black whip, by any chance? I’d heard it was down here.”
“I told Nicky somebody’d come lookin’ fer it.” Neda was an enormous woman with dark, shiny skin and eyes that were a milky, unfocused gray. She sat precariously balanced on a small stool, surrounded by baskets of linens. A stack of perfectly folded facecloths rested in her lap. She swiveled her round head, with its knot of thick, braided hair, toward a shelf to Matthew’s left. “That it?”
“Sure is,” he said, wincing at his own comical effort to alter his voice.
“Well, fetch it on back to your master then, boy, ’fore Nicky decides to sell it, like he was plannin’ to.” She squinted at him, blinking repeatedly. “Big one, ain’t you?”
Matthew grabbed the whip, keeping his eye on the door through which Nicky might return at any second. He hid his relief as his hand wrapped around the familiar hilt. “Huge, Mama says. Thanks!” he called as he ducked out the doorway, feeling as though he’d just gotten away with far more than he deserved.
He heard Neda chuckle loudly as he crept back down the hallway. “Hey Nicky, guess what? The Black Bandit just came and got his whip back. And you missed him. What do you think of that, Nicky boy?”
Chapter Eight
“That’s servants’ gossip.” Georgia scowled. “Haven’t you better sources than that?”
Stuart broke a flower off the hall arrangement—from the center again, as he always seemed to do, no matter how many times the house staff had asked him not to—and slipped it into his lapel. “Better sources than servants? They’re the best sources there are, Peach. Now that our Bandit’s a public mystery, everyone wants in on the fun. Of course, the promise of a few coins for Bandit stories doesn’t hurt, either.”
Georgia planted her hands on her hips. “You’ve wasted your money. Really, a whip loose in the hotel laundry? That’s nonsense.” She took a step closer to him. “Honestly, Stuart, isn’t the Bandit selling enough of your papers? Now you pay people to invent collaborations?”
Stuart pouted. “You think so lowly of your own brother? Your own flesh and blood?”
“You are perfectly capable of such a thing.”
He snatched his hat from the hands of the waiting butler. “Loath as I am to disappoint your high moral standards, this tale just happens to be genuine. A black whip showed up in the laundry at the Palace Hotel last night, and some tall young lad snatched it back before anyone could get a good look at it or at him. Absolutely Bandit-worthy, in my humble opinion, and straight from the mouth of a highly respected source.”
Georgia frowned. “I’ve never known your opinion to be humble. Highly respected sources? In a hotel laundry?”
“On Mama’s grave, Peach,” Stuart said, leaning in and lowering his voice, “the whip’s for real.” He put on his gloves. “I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s the talk of dinner tonight at the Hawkinses. Mrs. Hawkins has become one of the Bandit’s most ardent fans. Imagine that.”
Georgia winced. Stuart knew his strategy. Bedillia Hawkins was by far the most excitable woman Georgia had ever met. If by some remote chance the newspaper account of a Black Bandit whip sighting didn’t stir the public’s imagination, Bedillia Hawkins would surely finish the job. It would be the town’s juiciest gossip by sunrise. Stuart had probably made sure they would be dining at the Hawkinses tonight for just that reason.
“Don’t you think, Georgia, dear?” Bedillia inquired of her obviously distracted dinner guest.
“Mrs. Hawkins?” Miss Waterhouse blinked, pulling herself back to the topic at hand. Matthew couldn’t say he blamed her for her wandering thoughts. The conversation had been frightfully dull until the subject of the Bandit came up.
“I was saying, Georgia dear, how so much gossip seems to be coming out of the Palace Hotel these days,” repeated Mrs. Hawkins. “I was asking Mr. Covington if he finds it tiresome to be staying there, with so much going on. Bodies, thefts and whips—dear me, what will we see next?”
Matthew tried not to wince. He supposed he should be grateful they’d made it through the soup course before someone raised the dreaded subject.
The whip. Thompson’s expression had been unbearable when he’d held out the Herald’s account of the wayward whip. There, next to the latest installment of the Black Bandit’s adventures, was a tantalizing article about how a mysterious whip had surfaced in the laundry of the Palace Hotel. How a suspicious individual had stolen into the laundry and taken it back. Could the stealthy young man have been the Black Bandit himself? The text hinted at a variety of things that could set tongues and imaginations into motion all over the city. Based on Mrs. Hawkins’s fascination with the subject, it had been successful.
“Do you think he’s real, Miss Waterhouse? This bandit of your brother’s invention?” Mrs. Hawkins winked at Stuart while she asked the question. It made Matthew wonder just how often people used Georgia to get to her brother. Judging from her expression, it happened frequently, and she found it highly irritating.
“The bandit or the author?” Miss Waterhouse nearly succeeded in hiding the edge in her voice.
“Why, the Bandit, of course. Everyone knows who the author is, even if they aren’t saying.” Mr. Hawkins raised his glass in Stuart’s direction and let out a hearty laugh.
“Hawkins, you flatter me,” Stuart said, lifting his glass in turn. Matthew noted he neither denied nor confirmed the insinuation.
Miss Waterhouse had to work to raise her voice above the resulting hubbub. “I find myself wishing he were real,” she said, more sharply than he guessed she meant to. “I certainly would welcome him. San Francisco seems to be in dreadfully short supply of men with noble character—present company excepted, of course.”
Matthew wondered, by the way she said it, if she’d added the last remark out of sheer obligation rather than any genuine respect for the men in the room.
“Georgia doubts my sources, Mrs. Hawkins. She feels I manufactured the whip’s appearance to sell papers. That I’m printing shameless gossip rather than verifiable facts. As if I’d ever print anything but the honest truth.”
“Stuart Waterhouse,” laughed the rather besotted man next to him, “when have you ever printed the honest truth?”
“Miss Waterhouse,