“You have no right to upset her like this,” he said to Sarah. “You should be ashamed of yourself. A nurse should have more respect for her condition.”
“This gives me no pleasure, Mr. Dudley, I assure you. But the fact remains that someone killed Dr. Blackwell and his son. You and Mrs. Blackwell have more reason than anyone else to have wanted Dr. Blackwell dead.”
“But we had no reason at all to want his son dead,” Dudley reminded her.
Sarah bit her tongue. No one was to know that Calvin’s killer had tried to implicate him in Blackwell’s death. This was something only the real killer could know, and Malloy was using the information in hopes of tricking that person into betraying himself.
“I’m sorry our visit has been so uncomfortable to you,” Sarah said, “but I thought you might want to know this information. I’ll understand if you no longer want me treating the baby.”
Letitia Blackwell didn’t even look at her. She was staring off into space, her face creased into a frown of concentration. “Peter, do you know what this means?”
“No, my dear, I don’st,” he said, still worried. Perhaps he was afraid the shocks of the past few minutes had unhinged her mind.
“If my marriage to Edmund wasn’t legal, then my child is illegitimate. My father should have no objections if I marry quickly to give my child a name.”
“Letitia, dear,” he began, his face reflecting his serious reservations, but she paid him no heed.
“I’ll send for him at once. He can’t stop us this time. I’m of age, and he doesn’t control my life any longer. Besides, I have to think of my child’s reputation. And my own,” she added, still thinking out loud.
Dudley looked terrified. Most likely, he saw the flaws in this plan and realized that Symington could, and most certainly would, have many objections to it.
Sarah could have given them both some advice on how to handle the situation, but she doubted they would welcome it. Or that Letitia would even allow her to speak. She would have given a lot to witness the scene between father and daughter with the daughter’s feckless lover cringing in a corner. Too bad she’d have to miss it.
“I’ll be going now,” she said, but neither of the lovers even glanced at her.
Dudley was too busy trying to get Letitia to pay attention to him and listen to reason, but she was having none of it. For the first time Sarah saw the side of Letitia Blackwell that had led her to risk her father’s wrath and elope with a penniless schoolmaster. Stubborn to a fault, she was. Well, she wasn’t Sarah’s problem.
Without bothering to bid them farewell, Sarah let herself out. She certainly hoped Malloy planned to visit her tonight. She had a lot to tell him.
A
T THE END of the day, Frank made his way to Sarah Brandt’s house on Bank Street without even bothering to question himself. He could pretend he was going there to finish examining Tom Brandt’s files in an effort to find someone who might have had a motive for killing him. He’d come to realize they were both pretending that now. Frank had long since realized he would find nothing in the files, and he suspected she knew it, too. It was just an excuse for him to go over there.
Really, he just needed to see her to talk about the Blackwell case.
The evenings were growing cooler. Winter was coming, lurking just out of sight. Soon the winds would start to prowl between the city’s buildings, taking men’s hats and catching ladies’ skirts. Frank imagined a winter’s evening sitting in Sarah Brandt’s comfortable kitchen. Good thing the case would be solved long before then, and he’d have no more reason to meet with her. He could get very used to such comfort if he wasn’t careful.
Mrs. Ellsworth came out onto the porch with her broom in hand, even though the light was far too dim now even to see to sweep. She just wanted a word with Frank, and he was growing more patient with her. He’d learned that nosy neighbors could be quite helpful now and then.
“Good evening, Mrs. Ellsworth,” he called. “You’re out late.”
“It’s not so very late,” she said. “I just wanted to see if the moon was up yet. If there’s a halo around it, that means it will rain tomorrow. I was hoping to go shopping, but not if I’m going to get wet.”
Frank looked around, but he couldn’t see the moon. The tightly packed buildings permitted only a limited view of the sky, and that was more or less straight up. “The paper said it would be fair tomorrow, but if you’re determined to find the moon, you’re better off to look from an upstairs window,” he advised. “Or even the roof.”
“You’re probably right,” she said. “How was your day, Mr. Malloy?”
“Like all the rest of them,” Frank said noncommittally.
“I imagine all your days are very interesting,” she said with a smile that rearranged her wrinkles.
“Probably not as interesting as you think,” Frank said, thinking of the drunks and derelicts and thieves and killers he usually dealt with. “Police work can be pretty boring.”
“Oh, pshaw, Mr. Malloy. It’s not nice to tease an old lady. But you get along now. Mrs. Brandt has a lovely chicken roasting, and I’m sure there’s more than enough for you, if you haven’t eaten yet.”
A man didn’t need police training to understand Mrs. Ellsworth’s intentions. “I’ll be sure to get my share of it,” he said with a smile. “Good evening, and good luck with your weather predictions.”
Sarah Brandt was waiting at the door when he arrived at her porch. Her knowing grin told him she’d witnessed the exchange with Mrs. Ellsworth.
“Is the chicken ready?” he asked as he mounted the front steps.
“It’s started to get a little dried out. You’re later than usual. I was afraid you weren’t coming at all.”
He felt a funny little spasm in his chest that might have been his heart, even though he knew perfectly well she was just teasing him. She had that cat-in-the-cream grin on her face, the way she always did when she was trying to get the best of him. “If I’d known you had a roast chicken for me, I would’ve been here earlier,” he teased her right back.
“I’m going to have to speak to Mrs. Ellsworth about being more discreet,” she said, closing the door after him. “She obviously led you to believe I got that chicken just for you.”
“Didn’t you?” he asked innocently, hanging his hat on the rack by the door.
“Of course. I needed a way to keep you occupied so you wouldn’t interrupt me when I tell you all the things I learned this afternoon.”
He didn’t know how she always managed to best him in these little verbal matches they played. Probably because he liked the way she grinned when she won.
The chicken wasn’t dry at all, and she’d fried potatoes just the way he liked them. She’d even gotten some beer from her neighbor for him.
“What have you been up to, Mrs. Brandt?” he asked suspiciously as she smiled smugly at his reaction to the meal.
“I visited Mrs. Blackwell today,” she said.
“Do you go there
every
day?” he asked with a frown.
“Just about. I have to look after the baby, you know,” she added when he would have scolded her. “Do you know she hasn’t named him yet? He’s more than a week old and doesn’t even have a name.”
“I’m sure she’s had other things to worry about,” he said to annoy her. “So you visited Mrs. Blackwell. What happened?”
“She had another visitor already when I arrived.”
“Dudley?” he guessed hopefully.
“He’d apparently come to see the baby. The three of them were in the parlor together, alone.”
“Very cozy,” Frank noted.
“Especially because Amos Potter arrived right after I did. He was so desperate to see Mrs. Blackwell that I decided he should finally get the chance.”
“I’m surprised that butler didn’t physically stop you from intruding on her,” Frank said.
“Oh, I almost forgot: Granger is ill. He hasn’t been well for several days. Turns out he was just sick with guilt for not getting home first the day Blackwell was killed so he could’ve discovered the body instead of Mrs. Blackwell. Even the butler adores her. What is it about that woman that turns men into idiots?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Frank said.
She sniffed derisively, but she was too eager to tell her story to stop and argue. “Anyway, Granger was sick in bed with an upset stomach, so that little maid who let me in before was the only one guarding the door. It was easy enough to get past her with Potter.”
“I guess Potter was surprised to see Dudley.”
“Surprised? He was horrified. I told you the baby has red hair just like his. No one could miss the resemblance. Potter isn’t a fool. I’m sure he figured it out as quickly as I did, and he obviously knew that Letitia had had a lover before Blackwell. He asked a few leading questions and quickly determined Dudley was the man.”
“That must have been a blow. He thought Letitia would be his now that Blackwell is gone.”
“What was I just saying about her turning men into idiots?” she asked. “Potter couldn’t have Letitia if he were the last man alive on earth.”
“You can’t fault a man for dreaming.”
She just rolled her eyes. “Needless to say, Letitia wasn’t too happy to have Potter there—or me either, for that matter. She sent him on his way pretty quickly, and she tried to get rid of me, too, but I refused to leave.”
“I don’t doubt it for a moment. I know how stubborn you can be,” Frank said, taking another bite of his chicken.
“I’m not stubborn, I’m determined,” she insisted good-naturedly. “As soon as Potter was gone, I broke the news to them that Calvin Brown was dead.”
“You did
what?”
Frank shouted, nearly choking on his chicken.
“Oh, dear, was that the wrong thing to do?” she asked.
“I told you, only the killer would know about the suicide note!” He couldn’t believe she’d ruined his plan already.
“I didn’t tell them about that!” she said indignantly. “I just said he was murdered. They pretended they didn’t know who he was, but I could tell Dudley knew, at least.”
“Of course he knew. I told him the other night.”
“You did?” she asked, disappointed. “When did you see him? What did he say?”
“He said he didn’t kill Blackwell or Calvin. What do you think he said?” Frank was remembering why he’d once vowed never to see Sarah Brandt again and certainly never to let her become involved in another of his cases.
“Well, I think Letitia knew about him, too,” she said, still not showing any sign of understanding how she’d ruined the investigation. “She claimed that Blackwell had told her he’d been married before but his first wife had died young and that he didn’t have any children. She’s a good liar, so I wasn’t sure if she was telling the truth or not.”
Frank sighed.
He
would have known, but now he wouldn’t have the chance. “What else did you tell them?” he asked wearily.
“I didn’t tell them anything,” she said defensively. “I just pointed out that if they didn’t know about Calvin, they both had a very good reason for wanting her husband dead.”
“And if they did, they had a good reason, too,” he reminded her.
“So either way, they’re still good suspects. Unless Mr. Fong gave them an alibi,” she remembered.
“He didn’t.”
“He
didn’t?”
she asked with delight.
“Mr. Fong is a good businessman. He doesn’t know anything about his clients, including their real names. And he certainly doesn’t make note of their comings and goings. That saves him the trouble of being involved in unpleasant things like murder investigations. You should follow his example,” Frank pointed out.
She just gave him one of her looks. “There
was
one unfortunate result of my visit this afternoon,” she admitted.
“I’ve already counted more than one.”
She wasn’t the least bit repentant. “When I pointed out that Letitia’s marriage to Blackwell wasn’t valid, Letitia decided to inform her father that she was going to marry Dudley immediately. I guess she doesn’t feel the need to mourn a bigamous husband any longer, and she mentioned something about her child needing a father.”
“Her
father will be pleased to hear that. He offered me a thousand dollars to arrest Dudley as the killer.”
“What?”
“It’s a reward,” he said a little defensively, “not a bribe.”
“It’s not a bribe unless Dudley is innocent. Does he really think he’s guilty, or does he just want to get rid of Dudley? And when did you see Symington?”
He didn’t feel he needed to explain his activities to her. “I think he wants to get rid of Dudley and hopes he’s the killer.”
She frowned thoughtfully. “A thousand dollars is a lot of money. Some detectives would make sure Dudley was found guilty whether he was or not.”
“Do you think I’m one of them?” he asked, stung.
She was so surprised he knew she hadn’t even thought of this. “Of course not! I know you better than that! But Symington doesn’t. I was just thinking he must believe he’s made sure he’ll be rid of Dudley and have Blackwell’s murder settled, too. What an evil man!”
Frank felt a pang of guilt. Sarah Brandt was sure he wouldn’t take a bribe to convict an innocent man, but he knew his honesty was inspired only by the fear of seeing disappointment in her eyes. In his own way, he wasn’t any better than Maurice Symington. “Maybe Symington thinks Dudley is really guilty. In any case, he’s just trying to protect his daughter.”
“He’s done a poor job of it so far. First he lets her get involved with Dudley and nearly elope with him, then he gives her to that charlatan Blackwell, and all the time she’s using morphine. Heaven help her if he’d been neglecting her!”
She was right, of course. “Maybe Dudley really did kill Blackwell, though. He’s still a good prospect.”
“And so is Symington,” she reminded him. “Maybe he’s trying to make sure you don’t look any farther than Dudley. That way, he’d get rid of Dudley and save his own neck in the process.”