A/N: Sorry about the delay in posting this, I've been having a few issues accessing as a direct link. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this chapter and of course reviews are always welcome :)
Boston, February 1899
By the time Amelia had coordinated her affairs and arrived in Boston, it was the middle of February. Contacting her uncle went to the expected lengthy pains that it always did. She loved him dearly, but the man was chimeric, to say the very least.
She stepped off the train into South Station, a fresh construct that the ever-growing city was in desperate need of. It was finished not even two months before - creating a streaming bustle of people. With foresight of how the world around her was changing, the trains screamed with a harrowing whistle whilst smoke and steam mingled as one.
Outside of professional meetings, she rarely presented herself in the expected ways of her class. Amelia usually opted for a simple shirtwaist and walking skirt on most days, treasuring her comfort in the confines of the estate. However, regardless of how informal her rendezvous with her uncle was to be, she found the rare occasion to don one of her finer investments.
In a matching fan skirt of burgundy and a beaver lined jacket, Amelia also paraded her muff hand warmer made from marten and a hat that stood tall with both feathers of black ostrich and marabou.
All of it was futile in the hope of keeping the northern chill out however. Regardless of the fur that was wrapped tight around her, she was not as successful as she hoped for. When the harsh Atlantic gale from the docks blew through the wide halls of the station, her bones shivered whilst she tensed her shoulders.
As Amelia stepped through the steam of the great metal beast behind her, she felt as though she was that stupid little child that she had been so many years ago. In a desperate attempt to forsake the winds, she tried her best to politely push through the rabble of doddering folks in matching refinery.
The never-ending terrazzo marble floor caused an endless echo of the expected clip-clop of heels and the thwack of walking canes across the grand structure. Yet all the same, this was a new building, something she had not seen or experienced before.
Boston, for all its familiarities, seemed to be an ever-evolving town. A place where the old were cherished, but advancements in society were never frowned upon. Something that Amelia could utterly appreciate.
Exiting the station, with a few unscrupulous addle pates barging past her for one reason or another, she stepped into the all-familiar streets. The smell, the markets, the people, everything brought back a crashing sense of nostalgia whilst she pursued forward in a bid to block out the involuntary memories. She was here to meet Josiah, that was all.
Pulling the letter from her jacket with her hare lined gloves, she examined the notice.
Past the glass factory. Meet me at 22.
She scoffed to herself, as it was hardly as tight-lipped as he intended. Amelia felt an odd twist at the bottom of her stomach. Something was just not quite right. She continued to pace, without paying too much attention to the note she had just read. After all, a woman, regardless of her station, alone and dazed reading a note, would certainly only invite trouble.
Her skirts clipped around her boots, while the harsh port wind uncombed the soft curls that framed her face.
Across the port way, when she approached the door of the address she had been given, she was not quite sure what to expect, as her uncle was known for his dubious habitats. Yet this in itself was far more unbecoming. A shrewd mining hut with broken hinges and mouldy windows. Almost doubting herself, she was unsure if this was even the correct establishment.
She knocked twice, firm and filled with purposefulness. Nothing.
Amelia knocked again, growing impatient. Forced into business by the man and he didn't even have the curtsey of answering the door.
Again and again, she knocked. Filled with more ferocity than the last, she rasped her knuckled until the cold dull ache hit them.
Finally, the door pulled away, with her uncle standing uncharacteristically dishevelled. His un-ironed shirt loosely hanging from him and his usual slick black hair crumpled in a tousle on top of his head.
'Oh, my dear!' he belched, with a distinct smell of something or other on his breath. 'Do... do come in.'
Moving to the side, he gestured more clumsily than usual, but Amelia paid no mind. If he was not in the mood to give her sense, she would feed him coffee until he was well and good enough.
'Please,' Josiah slurred, ushering her to what she supposed was the parlour, 'I'm so sorry, my sweet dear, my little caneton.'
Attempting to not roll her eyes and scoff, she ignored the endearment.
'It's been,' her uncle began, almost falling onto the chaise longue behind him and very nearly toppling off of the back, 'it's been... a strenuous day.'
'Very well,' Amelia sighed, 'I would have liked to speak with you under more controlled circumstances,' she remarked, looking at him with a slight disregard.
How could he do this? She thought to herself, slightly betrayed and utterly caught off guard.
'Well? Out with it then.' She snapped, perhaps a little harsher than she intended.
He gazed up; eyes unfocused as he rummaged in his pocket.
'Uncle, for the love of God, what on earth has happened?' Growing more and more frustrated with his self-inflicted misery, Amelia took off her gloves and pulled the silver cigarette case from her pocket.
'Oh, Amelia,' Josiah remarked, putting his head in his hands whilst shaking his head rather dramatically. 'I made a terrible business...' he paused, trying to suppress another belch, 'decision.'
Amelia pursed her lips, raising her eyebrow at the older man. Perhaps she was being a little too irritable. The man was only drunk after all.
She held her tongue and allowed him to continue.
'An investment of mine went horribly, horribly wrong. People have died, my dear Amelia. Innocent people.'
His hands dropped from his face, revealing watery pockets all over it.
She was stunned. What in the world was he on about? Her Uncle, of all people, involved in such crimes?
'I'm afraid I don't understand, Uncle.' Amelia managed to let out, her voice soft and low.
'Some... associates of mine, they were to carry out a job of theirs, but...'
Amelia furrowed her eyebrows. This all sounded quite criminal. She had always known her uncle would dance with the interpretations of the law, but not something like this. This didn't sound right at all.
She looked away, unable to meet the anguish in his eyes. She cast her gaze into her cigarette, lighting it and hoping that all that he said was some drunken rambling from a man too far into his whiskey.
Attempting to find some excuse, some distraction, she peered around the room, taking puff after puff, whilst her uncle led out the odd sniffle or two.
'I think some coffee is order, don't you, Uncle?'
With all the composure she could muster, she stood and waltzed over to the side cabinets. A kitchen would have been too much of a generous word as the cramped confines only held the very basics. She dreaded to think why Josiah was here or even how he came across the property. However, she figured perhaps it was best to ask that another time.
Throwing the end of her cigarette in an empty tin - which already housed plenty of ends - she rummaged around as best she could to find the coffee. With little hope of finding a percolator, she filled an old saucepan and placed it on the singular gas unit.
When she finally found the coffee and poured it into the saucepan, something out of the corner of her eye caught her attention.
At first, it was the newspaper, discarded and strewn on the floor, but then she saw the cutout on the table. Curiosity got the better of her and the room filled with the scent of coffee grounds.
OUTLAW GANG WANTED OVER HEIST
The headline read. She picked it up tentatively, not wanting to read it, but couldn't bear to ignore it.
Pinkertons Increase Search
A gang of criminals, believe to be the outlaw Dutch van der Linde escaped with approximately $150,000 after a bloody gunfight with Pinkerton agents in Blackwater yesterday. The bank was moving the money out by boats after a string of stagecoach robberies in the area. The authorities believe that the men must have stashed the money in Blackwater before fleeing and the town has been put on high alert.
She put it down, afraid to read anymore. Her stomach recoiled as her eyes glazed over, unable to understand. Was her uncle involved in this? Why did he have it cut out? Was it a trophy?
Amelia stood there for what felt like hours, trying to think of the words, the questions, and any answer that could be given that would make this make sense.
'I didn't know it was to be a heist, not like that anyway,' her uncle said after some time as Amelia stood there frozen.
'I...' he began, and Amelia willed herself to turn to face him. It couldn't be, surely? Her Uncle Josiah, who saved her from her beastly parents, who brought her dolls and books, who gave her everything, was involved in such deplorable behaviour?
'Tell me, Uncle. Tell me the truth about all this!' She was mad, so very mad. Hurt and betrayed, everything in her body told her to scream and kick and curse his soul to damnation. Amelia was not a woman to tolerate petty theft, let alone something quite like this.
He told her. From beginning to end, how he was unaware of what his investment quite was. How he knew it wasn't strictly legal and according to his sources, the owners certainly didn't deserve the money, but at least nothing that was too questionable. He thought it was a movement similar to theirs, people trying to do their best to syphon the wealth from the greedy, the corrupt, into the pockets of the downtrodden who were cast away by society.
Not once did Amelia interrupt, and by the time she poured their coffees, they sat there in silence.
'It seems like an easy oversite,' was all she could muster.
'Perhaps.'
'How could you have not known they were Outlaws?' the mirth had left her voice as she wrapped her hands around the coffee, the only relief in this barren place.
'Half of our employees are former Outlaws, Amelia.'
'Former,' she muttered under her breath, rather childishly if she was being frank with herself.
Her uncle looked at her with an exhausted sorrowfulness she rarely saw from him. A part of her thought it served him right, being so hasty to make 'ethical' money, as he would put it. The coffee was rancid, so much so she only managed a mouthful and feared that even a cigarette wouldn't cleanse her of its bitterness.
'Well, I assume you read my letter in full? About the state of the finances?' Desperate to change the conversation topic to anything other than this nonsense.
He gave a wave of his hand, not quite as enthusiastic as his usual self.
'I did, my dear. Knowing you, I have high hopes that you have many a trick up your sleeves...'
At least, he was growing soberer, Amelia thought to herself.
'I have, however, gone to the liberty of securing you both a short term and long-term solution.'
She couldn't help but raise her eyebrows in doubt. God, she thought to herself, this best be legal.
'Do not worry!' he fished into his pocket for another cigarette. 'It is some racing horses coming into their own. An acquaintance of mine has recently fallen quite ill and his poor wife is selling off his acquisitions. With all the rage of racing horses against one another these days, it will give a nice minor bump up in those woes of yours.'
She pursed her lips, both sceptical of the origin and cynical and her uncles' prospects all in the same thought.
However, when she took a moment to herself, she was not really in a position to throw away any rope that could pull her from the growing current. After all, her pride and morals were one thing, but she had her people to look after. Not just them, but their families, too. Was reasonable doubt such a bad thing? The odd turning of the other cheek? Or was her uncle making her complicit in another "bad investment"?
'Very well,' she sighed, standing to leave. 'I trust you will make the appropriate arrangements?'
He smiled with a soft curve to his moustache, his eyes drooping ever so slightly from the reign of his sobering intoxication. Opening his arms to her, she couldn't help but already begin to forgive him. Returning to his embrace, Amelia pulled on her gloves and adjusted her hat.
'The horses should be with you in a month or two, I assure you.' Guiding her to the door, Amelia hoped that at the very least, he had the good sense to get some sleep and leave the hovel he had found himself in.
'Amelia, my dear, please,' he took her hand as she stepped through the threshold, 'nothing like this will happen again, I promise you.'
No matter how much she wanted to stay mad at him, she simply could not. With a gentle smile, she placed a tender kiss on his cheek and squeezed his hand in return.
'Of course, Uncle. I know you would not.' Whether that was to reassure herself or him, she could not say at that very moment. She left without further comment and proceeded back to South Station, feeling much more exhausted than she thought she would.