If you are new to my weekly serialized historical fiction novel The Unfrozen Sea, welcome. All episodes are free to subscribers and non-subscribers alike. Episodes 1 through 5 available on this newsletter.
In today’s episode, Temple Hayden meets with Navy Capt. Olin Randahl to close out his last case for the U. S. Marshals Service involving stolen top secret U.S. Navy documents. He finds that Randahl has slipped him the name of a mysterious young woman who might be involved. Hayden’s instinctive curiosity leads him to San Francisco.
For more information about the historical background to the novel, please click here:
Montgomery Street, San Francisco, 1904 from “Victorian San Francisco - The 1895 Illustrated Directory”, Wayne Bonnett, Windgate Press, 1998.
By the time Hayden reached San Francisco, he had questions he should have asked Randahl. But he set them aside. Reno Jack and the Marshals Service no longer occupied his mind. Evangeline did. By now she had explained things to her father and settled in to wait for Hayden’s next move.
In the ferry building, he checked the Southern Pacific Railroad timetables. The Owl Limited, an overnight service, was due to depart for Los Angeles at seven pm. He rummaged through his pocket for something to write on and came up with Olin Randahl’s card. He flipped it over. On the back, Randahl had written his telephone number and below it: Irene Watteson, 513A Montgomery Street. Hayden shoved the card back in his pocket. Damn you, Randahl. Why didn’t you just come right out and ask me? Because you knew I’d refuse. Victor Onslow’s lady friend is no concern of mine.
The house on Montgomery Street, a narrow, two-story Queen Anne Victorian at the corner of Commercial Street, was an anomaly among the surrounding shops, banks, and business establishments. The lower level had been converted to a law office and a steep staircase lead up to apartment 513A. The woman who answered Hayden’s knock peeked out a curtained window before opening the door. Hayden brushed back his coat to expose the marshal’s badge pinned on his vest and brushed back his moustache.
“Irene Watteson?”
The woman clutched her collar. “I’m Mrs. Watteson, Irene’s mother. Are you with the police? I called the police department yesterday.”
Hayden looked past her. “Is she at home? I want to talk to her.”
The color drained from Mrs. Watteson’s face. “Something’s happened, I just knew it.”
“She’s not here?”
“Not since last Sunday. That’s why I called the police. What has happened?”
“Nothing I know of has happened to her. Do you know when she’ll be home?”
Mrs. Watteson smiled and opened the door wide. “Please step inside, Officer. I’m being rude. Do come in.”
Hayden glanced around the front parlor. Morning light from the big front windows deflected through beige curtains gave the room an amber glow. Multi-colored Chinese rugs overlapped on the dark wood floor. A display of photographs in ornate frames rested on top of an upright piano. They caught his eye.
“Is your daughter one of these?”
“Yes. This one, Mrs. Watteson said. “We had it taken two years ago. Her nineteenth birthday. It’s a lovely likeness, don’t you think? Oh, how silly of me. You don’t know my Irene. Mr. Taber is such a skilled camera artist. Of course, Irene is such a lovely young woman, his work was made easy. He took all these others too. All very elegant, if I do say.”
Irene’s bright, intelligent eyes, engaging yet vulnerable, gazed out from the photograph. A smooth aristocratic face, well-defined cheekbones, long dark hair fashionably upswept and pinned, a lace-frilled white blouse, and a single strand of pearls at her throat. Mrs. Watteson gently placed the photograph back on the mantel.
“She’s Russian, you know,” Mrs. Watteson said. “My late husband, the Reverend Doctor Watteson discovered her as a young girl in China. We were missionaries, you see, at the China Island Mission compound in Chefoo. Uh, that’s in Shandong Province. There were so many desperate refugees in those days who had fled Russia following the assassination of Tsar Alexander II in 1881. Many came to China, families broke apart. Tragic. There were many orphans and strays. Irene’s parents were arrested by the Okhrana—the Russian political police. Most likely some malfeasance concocted by the police against her father. We never knew who they were. They realized escape was impossible with their infant daughter so they left her in custody of the Mission. I’m certain they intended to return for her.”
“What became of her parents?”
Mrs. Watteson shook her head. “We never found out. Transported back to St. Petersburg for some sham trial, I expect. Perhaps imprisoned in Siberia. So many were. Some years later we discovered they had been executed by the Okhrana. A terrible time.”
“And you and your husband brought the girl here to San Francisco?”
“Not at first. She was scarcely a year old when we found her at the mission. Over the next few years, we visited her often. She was such a bright-eyed angelic child—as you can see in the photograph. We came to know poor little Irene and when we had to leave China… Officer, I’m sorry, I don’t know your name.”
“Special Deputy Marshal Hayden.” He managed a polite grin. “Pleased to make your acquaintance, ma’am.”
“Oh, likewise. Now, where was I? Oh yes, China. All foreigners were forced out ten years ago—1894. The year of the horse, by the Chinese calendar—when Japan and China went to war. We left Shandong along with the others. The Reverend couldn’t bear to leave without little Irene. She was almost twelve years old by that time, such an endearing fragile thing but smart as a whip. Knopka, he called her in Russian; his little button. He loved her so. We both did.”
She took a deep breath. “You must return our little Knopka to me, Marshall Hayden.” She dabbed her tears with a lace-bordered linen handkerchief. “Please forgive me… and permit me to continue. We brought Irene to San Francisco as our ward. She speaks Russian fluently and properly, the Reverend saw to that. He insisted she should know her heritage. He told her how her parents had disappeared at the hands of the Okhrana. Irene hated the Russians for what they did. Perhaps we should not have told her. But children find out such things anyway, don’t they?”
“I reckon folks find the truth sooner or later.”
Mrs. Watteson smiled. “Irene attended Miss Lake’s School here in San Francisco and eventually came to accept that the Russian people were not at fault for her calamity. She met many fine Russian families here. She studied Russian music at the conservatory with Miss Chernikova. Irene has such a lovely contralto.”
“Did you ask Miss Chernikova if she knows where your daughter is?”
“I did. She has not seen her for some time. And I tried to reach Mr. Alberts as well.”
“Who is he?”
“Mr. George Alberts. An upstanding Christian gentleman who has taken an interest in my Irene. Oh, his behavior has been exemplary. He’s not given to the common vices, tobacco and alcohol and the like. Irene is a level-headed young woman, Marshal. I’m certain nothing is amiss in that regard. Mr. Alberts is in the real estate trade. Quite successful too.”
“How did your daughter meet him?”
“I really can’t say for certain. Irene is an adult, you understand, and I try not to interfere.”
“Do you think maybe she has gone off with Mr. Alberts? Eloped or some such?”
“A tryst? Oh, merciful Heavens, no. Irene is not given to flights of fancy.”
“I am loathe to ask, Mrs. Watteson, since it is of a personal nature. But has your daughter taken her personal effects, jewelry, clothing?”
“Why, no. Nothing is missing to my knowledge.”
“Do you have an address for Mr. Alberts? Or a telephone number?”
“Regrettably I do not.”
“Has your daughter got other suitors?”
“She was seeing a young man from Hayes Valley. Mr. Victor Onslow. He works over in the navy yard at Mare Island. I have never met him. I’m sure he is no more than a casual acquaintance.”
“Well, Mrs. Watteson, I reckon I can track him down, and Mr. Alberts too. In the meantime, if you can give me a few particulars, Irene’s full name, her height and so forth.”
Mrs. Watteson beamed. “Thank you, Marshal Hayden. Irene is my exact height, one inch over five feet, and considerably more svelte, I might add. Her name is Irene Watteson, as you know. Her birth name, however, was Irina Petrovna Vasilyeva.”
“Can you write that down for me?”
On his way to the California Street cable car, Hayden tried to fit pieces of the puzzle into place. Questions asked, questions answered: Mr. George Alberts? George Albert Jacobs. Reno Jack. But why would he put on fancy airs for a girl half his age? Because he found out her boyfriend Victor Onslow worked in the navy yard. He used them both to get the safe’s combination. And he paid the girl for the combination with gold he took from the bank in San Francisco.
Hayden stepped off the cable car at its Market Street terminus as the ferry building clock struck twelve noon. Still a piece missing. What’s a young pretty girl like Irene Watteson—or Irina Petrovna Vasilyeva—intend to do with Reno Jack’s gold?