“Because the last time I wore them, the Major said they lit up my eyes.”
“Then buy your own sapphire earrings.”
Ida let out a bark of laughter. “You have no respect for your elders.”
“Why should I?” Caroline tossed out. “I’m the one with the sapphire earrings you want so badly.”
If she gave Ida an inch, the woman would take fifty miles. Still, Caroline had a grudging respect for the first lady because she saw a side of her few people did. Ida’s health was brutalized by epileptic seizures, a crippled leg, migraine headaches, and periodic spells of melancholy that robbed her of the ability to rise from bed. Mrs. McKinley was in danger of becoming a recluse due to her infirmities and often stayed locked in her bedroom, where she obsessively knitted baby booties.
Both the president and Mrs. McKinley’s doctor recommended more interaction with the world, so Caroline had begun arranging regular tea parties with charitable groups and the wives of government officials. If loaning Ida a pair of sparkly earrings made her feel better, Caroline would happily do so.
Especially after the kindness both McKinleys had shown her. Last month Caroline’s brother had been arrested for treason in Cuba. Caroline had immediately offered her resignation, but the president refused to take it. Luke hadn’t been found guilty yet, and the military was keeping the scandal quiet until his fate could be decided.
Luke had always been a reckless daredevil who tempted fate and got into one scrape after another. But a traitor? Caroline couldn’t believe it of him. Somehow Luke had stepped into a dangerous mystery down in Cuba, and she would do her best to unravel it.
But if that failed, she needed to nurture her connections in the White House in the hope of someday winning a presidential pardon for Luke. Treason was a hanging offense, and if Luke was found guilty, her connection to the McKinleys might be her only chance to save her brother’s life.
Two
Nathaniel Trask was a lucky man. Returning to Washington, DC, fresh off a major triumph and the assurance of a promotion, he vaulted up the steps of the Treasury Department. Exhilaration from his victory in Boston still pulsed in his veins, for he loved nothing better than solving complicated criminal schemes.
It was seven o’clock on a Thursday evening, but it went without saying that his boss would still be in his office, for Nathaniel and Wilkie were like-minded people. They shared a friendship that dated back to their Chicago days, when John Wilkie was a crusading journalist and Nathaniel a hard-boiled detective on the city’s south side. When John Wilkie became the unconventional choice to lead the US Secret Service, he brought Nathaniel along with him, and ever since they had worked side by side to restore the agency’s tattered reputation into one of faultless professionalism.
Nathaniel’s footsteps echoed in the empty corridors as he made his way toward the wing housing the Secret Service administrative offices, where Wilkie welcomed him with a broad grin. At forty, Wilkie was only two years older than Nathaniel and the youngest chief in the history of the Secret Service. He dressed in completely ordinary clothes and had nondescript hair. Only a reckless flash in his brown eyes hinted at his adventurous streak.
“There’s the man of the hour,” Wilkie said, giving Nathaniel a hearty handshake.
Nathaniel returned both the handshake and the grin, the tension from the five-month Boston assignment beginning to ease. Now that he was home, it was time to file the paperwork documenting how a gang of forgers had pulled off a million-dollar fraud by making counterfeit postage stamps. It had been a clever scheme. Fake paper money was under constant scrutiny, but who ever thought to look for fake postage stamps? The gang had made a healthy living off those counterfeit stamps for years before Nathaniel managed to track them down in Boston.
“News of the arrests has already made the local papers. Have a look at that,” Wilkie said as he tossed Nathaniel a newspaper folded open to the feature article.
Government Agent Foils Band of Scoundrels and Their Postal Depredations
“‘Postal depredations’?” Nathaniel asked. “Who writes this dreck?”
The slow smile that spread across his boss’s face was all the answer Nathaniel needed, for Wilkie had made a name for himself in the Wild West of yellow journalism in Chicago and knew how to spin the press. “I suggested a few colorful phrases to the reporter. I’m glad he took them. You’re a hero.”
“So long as they didn’t mention my name,” Nathaniel cautioned. The Secret Service was the wrong line of work for anyone craving fame or riches. While he loved the challenge of hunting down criminals and hauling them into a court of law, he’d never cared for attention.
“No names,” Wilkie assured him. “Still, it was brilliant work, and you’ve saved the government a mint. Literally. We should go out for a drink.”
“We should, except I don’t drink, and you never go out carousing this early in the evening.”
Wilkie snapped his fingers in mock dismay. “That’s right. Foiled again.”
Nathaniel and Wilkie were complete opposites, but it never hampered their friendship. Nathaniel was obsessively tidy, sober, and a rule-follower, while John Wilkie was freewheeling and hard-drinking, but they respected each other.
“Now,” Wilkie said as he returned to his desk, “about that promotion I mentioned.”
“Yes, about that.” It was hard to guess what Wilkie had in mind, for Nathaniel already occupied the top position in the counterfeit division.
“I know you hate the prospect of a management position,” Wilkie said.
Nathaniel stiffened. “Yes.”
“Which is why I have something completely different in mind. You’ll like it. A new challenge. You’ll meet interesting people and have loads of responsibility.”
Then why was Wilkie suddenly so eager to sell the position to him? Nathaniel had never balked at an assignment before. He’d sweltered in copper mines in New Mexico, ridden payroll trains through the desolate flatlands of the West, and once he’d lived for six months above a fish cannery to spy on international exports.
“What’s the job?” he asked softly.
“It’s the most important one in the agency. Pays well. Good housing.”
“What’s the job?”
“Guarding the president.”
Nathaniel bolted out of his chair. “Absolutely not. I’ll never work as a bodyguard. You know that.”
Wilkie held his hands out in a placating manner. “Calm down. President McKinley doesn’t want a bodyguard either. He thinks it smacks of European royalty and wants nothing to do with it.”
“Then why are we having this discussion?”
“Because I need a detective in the White House. One who never misses details, even if he’s been on duty around the clock. You don’t need to be plastered to the president’s side. He doesn’t want that any more than you do. But I need someone to monitor who has access to him. King Umberto of Italy was assassinated last night, and the man who shot him was a known anarchist. A system should have been in place to keep an eye on troublemakers like him. I need you to design such a plan for the White House.”
“Get someone else to do it.”