“I have no idea,” she finally responded. It seemed impossible, but every instinct told her that Luke had somehow pulled this off. Maybe he had worked through Gray, who knew about Luke’s tradition of giving her artichokes on their shared birthday. But if Gray was responsible for this, he would have signed the card.
She turned it over, and to her surprise, there was another typed message.Look for a better gift on November 15.
That was odd. November 15th didn’t have any special significance for her, and it was almost a month away. Could she expect another midnight delivery?
“It’s a little worrisome, Miss Delacroix,” Mrs. Fitzpatrick said. “That basket wasn’t here when I closed the kitchen last night, but there it sat when I unlocked things this morning. I asked the overnight guard about it, and he swore he didn’t put them here.”
She couldn’t imagine how Luke had gotten these to her, but she needed to quit underestimating him. Over the past few years he’d been running rings around all of them. A few months ago, he even helped Gray orchestrate a prank against their family’s archrival, all from his jail cell in Cuba. If anyone could figure out how to smuggle a basket of artichokes into the White House, it was Luke.
“The house is locked up tight as a drum overnight,” Betsy said. “Even the door at the end of the hall leading into the kitchen gets locked to stop anyone from getting into the wine cellar when no one is looking.”
That hallway had the only door into the kitchen, but slim windows high on the wall could open, letting a little natural light into the basement. Caroline ran her fingers along the windowsill and came away with plenty of dust. No one had come in through that window last night.
How could someone break into the kitchen? It was an appalling lapse in security, but she affected a casual tone.
“It must be someone on the staff,” she said, picking up the basket with a bright smile. “Don’t give it another thought.”
But Caroline thought about it for hours. All through the morning as she answered Mrs. McKinley’s mail, her thoughts constantly strayed to the basket of artichokes. It was impossible to stop the helpless smile that tugged on her mouth. It was so classically Luke. He loved pranks, and this was a good one. It had his signature all over it, even if she couldn’t begin to imagine how he’d done it or what he could possibly have planned for November.
At ten o’clock she headed down to the White House mailroom, where a telephone was on hand for staff use. She had to wait in line for it, but this call wouldn’t take long. All she wanted was to ask Gray if he was responsible for the artichokes, but the butler at their townhouse said Gray wasn’t available.
“He’s headed to the War Department to meet with that Lieutenant Ransom fellow.”
Philip Ransom was Luke’s best friend. They’d been roommates at the Naval Academy, even though they seemed ridiculously mismatched. In contrast to Luke’s roguish charm, Philip was so bashfully shy that she’d teasingly dubbed him Philip the Meek. It was a kinder nickname than what his fellow midshipmen at the Naval Academy called him, which was Twinkle Toes.
Philip now had the world’s dullest job cataloging maps in the basement of the War Department. Luke had never gotten over being expelled from the academy, but she secretly thought he was probably a lot happier for it in the long run. Otherwise he could have ended up like Philip, who graduated first in his class but was little more than a clerical drudge.
She hung up the telephone and raced off to intercept Gray at Philip’s office. Between the two of them, they might have insight into how those artichokes had magically appeared overnight in a locked and secured room.
The basement of the War Department was a bleak maze of dimly lit corridors with the same dank smell that permeated most basements. Caroline’s heels echoed in the concrete halls until she arrived at the map room, its door firmly closed.
She knocked. A moment later Philip Ransom opened it, looking as thin and pale as ever. He was a handsome man, with a lanky frame and blond hair clipped to military precision, but he suffered from the pallor of being trapped in a basement all day.
“Caroline,” he said in surprise. “Come in. Your brother is here.”
Gray rose from behind the worktable as she entered the room, but a crate of rolled maps clogged the space between them. Philip dragged the crate aside to clear a path, accidentally bumping into a coat tree. It wobbled, but he managed to catch it before it crashed to the ground. In the past few months, this cramped map library had become their war room as the three of them strategized ways to mitigate Luke’s dilemma. She didn’t know how Philip could stand working in this overstuffed, windowless room, but for now she appreciated its privacy.
“Happy birthday.” Gray smiled as he stepped around a floor globe to kiss her cheek.
“Thank you,” she replied. Gray held a chair for her at the single table. “Did you perhaps remember it with a particularly unique gift?”
He quirked a brow. “That’s a little forward, even for you. Of course you’re getting a gift, but it isn’t wrapped yet.”
“I’m speaking about the twenty-nine artichokes that mysteriously appeared in the White House kitchen this morning.”
Gray’s jaw dropped. It took a lot to render him speechless, but the artichokes did the trick. After a moment, he found his voice. “How did he pullthatone off?”
“So it wasn’t you?”
“It wasn’t me.” Gray met Philip’s eyes across the table. “Philip? Do you know anything about this?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Philip was so squeaky clean, he wouldn’t know how to lie if given a script and acting lessons. Besides, artichokes smuggled into the White House in the dead of night was a classic Luke stunt, not something from Philip the Meek.
She told Philip how Luke began gifting her with artichokes from the time they were children, and he confessed to being equally baffled as to how the artichokes could have appeared in a locked White House room.
She showed Gray the back of the note. “Does November 15th mean anything to you?”
