“I really don’t think it would be a good idea,” Mrs. Bates said. “I think it’s too soon for her to make a trip like that, and I’m hoping she’ll come home with us for a while, but that’s Elizabeth’s decision.”
“No, it isn’t,” Anna said, surprising both of her companions. “She’s coming home with me until she’s completely recovered. Mother can take care of both of us.”
“Are you sure your mother wouldn’t mind?” Elizabeth didn’t really care if the mother minded or not. Sticking with Anna was the safest course for her right now. Besides, she wanted to stay with Anna and she certainly needed to get to New York.
“If it makes her daughter happy, she won’t mind a bit,” Mrs. Bates said. “So that’s settled. All we need to do now is get your luggage from your other hotel, Elizabeth, and we can be on our way.”
She said something else, about how she’d had the maid freshen up the clothes Elizabeth had worn to the workhouse, but Elizabeth was no longer listening. How was she going to go to some hotel where she’d never stayed and retrieve luggage they didn’t have?
• • •
“I’m glad to see you looking so much better, Miss Miles,” Gideon Bates said while they waited on the sidewalk for the Willard Hotel doorman to summon a cab.
“Are you saying I looked terrible before, Mr. Bates?” Elizabeth replied.
But instead of being chastened, he said, “Yes, I am. I’ve hardly ever seen a woman look worse. You were practically at death’s door.”
“Oh, please have mercy, Mr. Bates. Your charm is overwhelming me.”
“Which, of course, was my intent all along,” he assured her with his overwhelmingly charming smile.
Somehow Elizabeth managed to remain unmoved by it.
A cab had pulled up and the doorman opened the door for them. When they were settled inside, Elizabeth gave the driver the name of the hotel she’d gotten from one of the bellmen when she’d asked him to suggest a respectable hotel where a single woman alone might stay.
The cab chugged off, leaving her nothing to do now but talk to Gideon Bates. If only he wasn’t quite so handsome and quite so appealing. She’d wanted David Vanderslice to accompany her. She could have told him any kind of tale, and he wouldn’t have dreamed of questioning her. But Mrs. Bates had insisted that Gideon go with her.
“Do you really think they’ll still have my luggage?” she asked, laying the groundwork for the misfortune that was going to befall her.
“Why wouldn’t they?”
“I don’t know. It just seems . . . Well, it might have been stolen or something. I’ve been gone a long time.”
“I suppose that’s possible, but not likely in a hotel like that.”
Elizabeth frowned, hoping she looked like a helpless young woman with little experience of the world. “Does that happen often?”
“What?”
“That someone staying in a hotel disappears and leaves their luggage behind.”
“I doubt it.”
Which just proved how much he knew. It happened all the time. Grifters always carried a cheap suitcase stuffed with newspapers that they could leave behind when they ran out on the bill so the hotel staff wouldn’t know they were gone until it was too late. “Then they might not realize they should keep the luggage until the person returns.”
“Don’t worry,” he said with that wonderful smile that made her really want to believe everything was going to be all right. “I’ll make sure they find your things.”
Which was the last thing she wanted. She could have groaned. “Mr. Bates, would you mind . . . ? I mean . . .” She frowned her helpless frown again.
“I’ll do whatever you wish, Miss Miles,” he said, and she was sure he would at least try.
She rewarded him with a smile of her own. “I’d like to go in alone, if you don’t mind. No, wait. Hear me out. You see, it’s very . . . embarrassing to admit one has been in jail, even for the best of causes.”
“Which is why I’m happy to do it for you,” he argued.
“No, please. If there’s any hope at all, a young woman alone is much more likely to win their pity than her overbearing escort.”
“Overbearing?” He seemed genuinely offended.
“As I’m sure you would become on my behalf if you felt I wasn’t receiving the right treatment.”
He couldn’t argue with that, and he didn’t try, but she didn’t like the way he was looking at her now, as if he’d seen something disturbing. What had she done to earn that look? She really needed to be more than careful with him.
Finally, he said, “So you want to go into the hotel alone to request your luggage, is that what you’re telling me?”
“Yes, if you don’t mind too terribly much. And rest assured, if I have any trouble at all, I’ll summon you immediately.”
He considered this for a long moment before he said, “All right, but don’t let them fob you off.”
“Oh, I won’t,” she lied, and rewarded him with another smile.
She left him waiting with the cab and walked into the quiet elegance of the hotel lobby. This place was tiny compared to the Willard, and no political hacks sat in the lobby waiting for someone important to walk by. Instead, a few well-dressed gentlemen read newspapers in the comfortable chairs, and bellmen moved soundlessly over the carpeted floors, carrying things here and there.
She walked up to the desk, in case Bates was watching her, and asked the clerk for the time. Then she mentioned she was meeting some other ladies and went over to an empty chair and sat down. A lone female wouldn’t sit long in a hotel lobby, but Elizabeth needed a moment to think. She could lie to Gideon and tell him her things had been stolen, but then he’d insist on seeing the manager and making a fuss. She thought of several other versions of the same lie, but they all ended with no luggage and Bates making a fuss. She could always tell him the truth, of course, that she was a grifter on the run who had never stayed at this hotel at all, but that didn’t seem like a very good idea, either. The only other alternative was for her to find a back door, sneak out and disappear. She had money in her purse and more in her corset. She could go to the station and take a train for New York. She’d be safe from Thornton and she wouldn’t have to lie to Gideon. It was the only sensible thing to do, after all. That’s what the Old Man would say, she was sure.
So why was she still sitting here?
Because she could imagine how frantic Gideon Bates would be and how upset Mrs. Bates would be and how devastated Anna would be if she just disappeared. How they would have the hotel searched and summon the authorities. And how very, very frightened they would be for her. She tried to tell herself they were nothing to her, so what did she care? They’d forget all about her in a week.