The guilty flush on his face indicated she’d guessed correctly. He sent her a bashful smile. “The Brewers beat the White Stockings, five to one. Life is good.”

She ought to be annoyed, but oddly it was exactly what she needed to hear. Inside the house, it was tense with anxiety and political rumblings, but in the rest of the world, life went on. Baseball games were played, the apple harvest was in full swing, and college classes were in session. While her corner of the world was shrouded in darkness, she needed to remember that somewhere the sun was shining.

“Did the Washington Senators play?” she asked.

The soldier looked momentarily surprised but cracked the paper open again in search of an answer. “They beat Boston, five to three.”

“Good,” she said softly, then leaned down to pick up the rest of the newspapers. She’d leave a few for the men in the parlor, but first she needed to scan every page before delivering a copy to Ida. If there was one negative word about the president, that page would be “lost” before it was delivered to her. Caroline carried the newspaper to a wicker chair at the far end of the porch. It would be easier to read out here amid the rustling of autumn leaves instead of the political haggling inside.

The front page was a shock. Emma Goldman had been arrested in Chicago and would soon be transferred to stand trial in Buffalo. A ghoulish political cartoon labeled her “the high priestess of anarchy.” Ten others had been arrested on the strength of their participation in various anarchist groups and publications. A sick feeling took root as she continued reading, for the news got worse. Members of Emma Goldman’s family had been arrested to pressure her into turning herself in. The adolescent children of Abe Isaak, another anarchist, had also been arrested, one girl only fifteen years old.

“This isn’t America,” she whispered. “This isn’t America.”

But it was, and Nathaniel had his hand in it.

After exchanging a dozen frustrating telegrams, Caroline finally tracked Gray down in Kansas, where he’d gone to help with the sale of the farm belonging to Annabelle’s family. The farm had no electricity or access to a telephone, so it had taken some doing for them to arrange a time and place where he could accept a long-distance telephone call from her.

She stood in the hallway off the hotel kitchen where a telephone was anchored to the wall. It wasn’t private, but she would finally have a chance to talk to Gray about Luke’s cryptic message regarding Captain Holland. She had made no headway in what Luke was trying to say about Key West, but perhaps Gray could make sense of it.