Murder On Gramercy Park

3

FRANK HAD BEEN RIGHT. THE NEIGHBORS HADN’T seen or heard a thing, and if they had, they weren’t going to share the information with him. The neighboring servants had given him a bit of gossip here and there, of course. Apparently, no one thought it appropriate that Mrs. Blackwell kept going out every afternoon after her pregnancy became noticeable. It was said she visited poor and sick people, too, which only outraged her detractors even more. If she had no care for her own health, she should at least have been concerned for her unborn child and avoided the filthy poor and their unspeakable diseases.

To Frank’s surprise, however, no one had a bad word to say about Dr. Blackwell, not even those who disapproved of his brand of medicine. He seemed to be a respectable gentleman who kept to himself and maintained the tone of the neighborhood. Until his unseemly death, of course. Maybe the neighbors were just happy to have someone more socially acceptable than an abortionist in residence. But whatever the reason, Frank could find no one with any idea of why the good doctor might have been murdered or who could have done it, and no one had so much as glimpsed the boy Amos Potter had told him was Blackwell’s abandoned son. They hadn’t seen anyone else coming or going from the house the previous afternoon, either.

So much for his boast to Sarah Brandt that he’d find the killer by nightfall.

The next morning, Frank returned to the Blackwell house to continue his investigation. The butler greeted him with the kind of condescending reserve to which Frank had become accustomed. Even servants felt superior to Irish policemen.

“How is Mrs. Blackwell today, Granger?” Frank asked.

“I’m sure I don’t know. That midwife you sent over is with her now,” Granger replied stiffly.

Frank fought down the instant anxiety he felt at the prospect of Mrs. Blackwell needing medical help so soon after her delivery. He had a momentary flash of his own wife with her life’s blood draining away after giving birth to their son, but he ruthlessly banished it. “The midwife?” he echoed with as little expression as possible. “Is something wrong?”

“Not that I am aware.”

Plainly, the butler thought it was none of his business, which was just too bad. He knew exactly where to get all the information about Mrs. Blackwell that he wanted. “When Mrs. Brandt is finished, tell her I want to see her.”

The butler nodded curtly, conveying his disapproval with every ounce of his being without uttering a sound.

“Is anyone else here that you haven’t seen fit to tell me about?” Frank asked with marked sarcasm.

The butler’s lips paled as he squeezed the blood out of them in his impotent fury. “Mr. Potter is in the study,” he said with obvious reluctance.

Good, Frank thought. Maybe Potter could give him some more information about Blackwell’s son, who was rapidly becoming his prime suspect.

When Frank entered the study, he found Potter staring uncertainly at the desk where Blackwell’s body had lain. The desk had been cleared, and all traces of the crime had been scrubbed away, except for an ugly stain in the carpet. Hearing Frank enter, Potter looked up with what Frank thought might have been alarm, but he quickly recovered himself.

“Detective, you startled me,” he said, self-consciously straightening his vest. “Have you located young Calvin yet?”

Frank shook his head. “It would help if you had an idea where to begin looking. There are hundreds of cheap lodging houses in the city.” He’d instructed some officers to begin making inquiries, but they weren’t having much success.

“If he’s even still here.” Potter sighed. “In his place, I’d have fled immediately. And Edmund was going to give him some money, you know. He could be anywhere by now, of course, but you should probably check with his mother to see if she might know his whereabouts.”

“Where can I find her?” Frank asked, annoyed that Potter hadn’t suggested this yesterday.

Potter frowned, obviously trying to remember. “It’s a small town in Virginia someplace. I’m not even certain I ever heard the name. Oh, dear, I guess I’m not being very much help to you.”

Frank had to agree. If Calvin Brown had indeed fled the city, no one would ever find him. “Did you remember anything else about Brown that might help?”

“I’m afraid not. But surely you have informants who can assist you,” Potter suggested hopefully.

“Only if I’m dealing with known criminals,” Frank said, trying to be patient. “Someone like Calvin Brown probably wouldn’t have been noticed by anyone in particular. He wasn’t here that long, and he wouldn’t have gotten into any trouble.”

“Ah, yes, you’re probably right. It’s only been a week or so since he first contacted Edmund. It’s my understanding that he saw an advertisement for one of Edmund’s lectures and recognized his picture.”

“You already told me about the lectures, but I’m not sure I understand why he had to give them. Couldn’t he just advertise that he was a doctor? Hang up a sign or something?”

“He was a healer,” Potter corrected him primly. “His treatments were quite revolutionary, not something the average person would easily understand, so he would give lectures explaining his successes in order to educate the public.”

Educate and dupe them into coming to him for treatment, Frank thought, but he said, “Who came to these lectures?”

“All sorts of people. There was no admission charge, of course. Edmund didn’t want fame or fortune for himself, but he felt it was selfish of him not to share his knowledge with those he could help.”

“He helped his wife, I understand.”

“Yes, Letitia was a complete invalid when her father called on Edmund for help. No doctor had been able to do a thing for her.”

“She must have been very grateful,” Frank suggested, not missing the fact that Potter had called Mrs. Blackwell by her given name.

“So grateful that she insisted on giving a personal testimonial at Edmund’s lectures. Her story brought him to the public eye and convinced many people to try Edmund’s services. Her family is quite socially prominent, you know.”

“So I gathered from meeting Mr. Symington. What was wrong with Mrs. Blackwell in the first place?”

Potter seemed shocked at the question. “I told you, she was an invalid.”

“You said it was a riding accident. Was she paralyzed? Crippled? Broken bones?”

“She was injured. She was in severe pain for almost a year, so severe she couldn’t rise from her bed. With only a few treatments, Edmund was able to relieve that pain so she could live a normal life again.”

Frank remembered what Sarah had said about most people getting well if they wanted to. Perhaps Blackwell’s true gift was being able to make people want to get better. He noted that Potter hadn’t told him exactly what Mrs. Blackwell’s injuries had been. Probably he didn’t know. For an instant Frank had an errant thought of asking Sarah Brandt to find out, but he quickly caught himself. If he truly wanted to keep her from getting involved in the investigation, that was exactly the wrong thing to do.

OUTSIDE MRS. BLACKWELL’S bedroom door, Sarah paused to take a deep breath. Venting the fury she felt at the woman would accomplish nothing. When she had mastered her feelings, she knocked on the door and entered without waiting for a reply.

Mrs. Blackwell appeared to be dozing, although still propped up on her mountain of pillows. She blinked uncertainly, obviously not recognizing Sarah at first.

“Oh, Mrs. Brandt,” she finally realized. Then she listened for a moment. “The baby, he stopped crying. Is he…?”

“He’s sleeping,” Sarah said. “The laudanum relieved him.”

She sighed and closed her eyes. Sarah thought she probably didn’t want to face her problems, and Sarah couldn’t really blame her. They must seem overwhelming at the moment, especially to a person who needed morphine to deal with a normal day.

After a moment Mrs. Blackwell opened her eyes again. They were clouded and full of anguish. “I never meant to hurt the baby. You must believe me.”

This was the opening Sarah had been waiting for. She stepped closer to the bed. “You were right not to stop taking the morphine. If you had, you most certainly would have lost the baby.”

She seemed relieved to hear this. “They said he would be fine, though. They said once he was born, he wouldn’t need it the way I do.”

“I’m sure they told you what you wanted to hear. It wasn’t in their best interests for you to stop using morphine, now was it?”

Her eyes filled with tears, but this time Sarah knew they were genuine and not an attempt to gain her sympathy. “I haven’t been able to stop taking the morphine, no matter how hard I try. How will he be able to stop? He’s so tiny…”

Her voice broke on a sob, and this time Sarah took one of her hands in both of hers. It was small and soft and icy cold. “I’ve seen this before,” she said. “With a baby, it’s possible to gradually decrease the amount you give him until he’s not dependent on it anymore. We’ll wait a few months, until he’s stronger, and then we’ll start weaning him off of it.”

“But I’ve tried to stop so many times! The first time almost killed me, and I’ve never been able to do it again. The pain is unbearable.” The tears were running down her cheeks unchecked now. Sarah felt her anger melting.

“We won’t let your baby suffer, Mrs. Blackwell.”

The younger woman looked at her with desperate eyes. “I know you’re a midwife, but will you take care of him yourself? Will you come back and make sure he’s all right and help wean him from that awful stuff?”

Sarah could not refuse. “Of course I will, if that’s what you want. Tell me, though, how did you begin taking the morphine in the first place?”

She closed her eyes and seemed to shudder. “It was… when I was hurt. I fell off a horse when I… I hurt my back and my neck. The pain was horrible, and they gave me morphine. It was the only way I could bear it.”

“Didn’t you consult any physicians?”

Mrs. Blackwell stared at her in amazement. “Of course! My father called in every doctor he could find. There were dozens. None of them could do anything for me. They said I’d be an invalid for the rest of my life. I didn’t leave my room for almost a year, and I hardly even left my bed. Walking was excruciating and I could only sit in a chair for a few minutes at a time. And then Edmund came.”

“Your husband,” Sarah said. “What did he do that the others didn’t?”

Mrs. Blackwell’s smooth brow furrowed as she struggled to explain. “He touched me. The others wouldn’t touch me. It caused me too much pain. But Edmund told me he could make me well if he could just do some simple adjustments.”

“What kind of adjustments?”

“To my spine. That’s how he cures people. It’s like a miracle. I felt better almost instantly. Within a few weeks my pain was completely gone.”

“But you still needed the morphine,” Sarah guessed.

Mrs. Blackwell closed her eyes again, and Sarah could only imagine the anguish these admissions cost her. “Edmund thought I shouldn’t need the morphine anymore because my pain was gone. My father thought so, too. I didn’t want to take it anymore, so I did what they told me and stopped taking it. I thought I was going to die.”

“Stopping morphine is extremely difficult. Few people ever succeed,” Sarah told her, not mentioning that some of the aids physicians sometimes used were even worse than the agony of withdrawal itself.

“But I did succeed!” she informed Sarah. “It was the hardest thing I ever did in my life, but I did it! I was finally free of both the pain and the morphine. I thought I could go back to my normal life again. That was all I wanted.”

“But you didn’t?”

Mrs. Blackwell sighed, and another tear slid down her cheek. “Edmund asked me to help him. He said he could cure many other people, just the way he’d cured me, but he couldn’t unless those people knew his treatments worked. He was going to give a lecture in the city, explaining his techniques and how successful they were, but he needed someone to testify, someone he’d cured. He said… I mean, after what Edmund had done for me, how could I refuse?” she asked, her eyes pleading for Sarah to confirm her decision.

“Of course,” Sarah said, knowing she could only imagine the pressure he must have put on her. “You must have been very grateful. But how did your father feel about it?” Sarah couldn’t imagine her own father allowing her to do such a thing as speak about her health problems at a public lecture.

“He didn’t really think it was proper, but he was so grateful to Edmund that he couldn’t refuse. I think he felt some sort of debt of honor to him. Edmund told me what to say. He wrote it out for me. All I had to do was read it, but I was so frightened! There were hundreds of people, and they were all looking at me. I was so terrified, I almost fainted. I don’t even remember giving the speech, but Edmund was very pleased, and many people came to him for his treatments after that. So of course he wanted me to speak again.”

Sarah was beginning to understand what had happened. “You must have been very frightened,” she guessed.

“I was so frightened, I knew I wouldn’t be able to get up on that stage again, but my father felt we owed Edmund for what he had done. Edmund hadn’t even accepted any payment for treating me, even though he’d been practically penniless. He only wanted my help. What could I do?”

“You could have told Edmund and your father how terrified you were,” Sarah suggested kindly.

“I did, but they couldn’t understand. They kept saying I’d get over it, that I’d be fine, just as I was the first time. But I hadn’t been fine the first time, and I couldn’t explain that to them! They made me do it, but the only way I could get through it was to take some morphine. Just a little,” she hastened to explain, lest Sarah think badly of her. “Just enough so I didn’t feel afraid. I wasn’t going to take it anymore after that, but…”

“But you couldn’t help yourself,” Sarah guessed. She’d seen the power of the opiate to hold someone in its thrall.

“Once I started again, I couldn’t seem to stop, especially when Edmund asked me to go to other cities for lectures. My father went with us, of course. It was all very proper, but I was still terrified of the crowds. I hid the morphine from them, so neither of them knew I was taking it. It was awful, lying to both of them and trying to buy the morphine when they didn’t know. They would have been so angry… and so disappointed with me.”

Sarah knew that morphine was readily available at any drugstore, but she also knew women of the upper classes had little freedom. An unmarried girl would have been chaperoned wherever she went. Mrs. Blackwell must have been clever indeed to manage to obtain her morphine without discovery.

“Then Edmund told me he’d fallen in love with me and asked me to marry him,” she went on, so anxious to tell her story that she hardly seemed aware of Sarah’s presence anymore. “I thought if he really loved me, he wouldn’t make me do the lectures anymore, but I was wrong. Once we were married, he could take me anywhere he went without worrying about a chaperon anymore. I wanted to stop the morphine again, but I couldn’st, not unless I told Edmund that I was taking it and unless he would let me stop doing the lectures. I tried telling him I didn’t want to do the lectures anymore, but he wouldn’t hear of it. He told me I had no choice, because without the lectures, he wouldn’t get new patients and he wouldn’t be able to make a living. He was my husband. I had to help him, didn’t I?”

Sarah chose not to answer that question. “I can understand that you wanted to do the right thing.”

“I don’t know what the right thing is anymore,” she said with a weary sigh.

“Well, one thing is for certain, with your husband gone, you won’t have to attend those lectures anymore. So if you’d like to try stopping the morphine again, I can help you when you’re stronger,” Sarah offered.

“I can’t think about that now,” she said wearily. “I can’t think about anything now. I just want to sleep.”

“That’s certainly a good idea. I’ll make sure no one bothers you.”

“Especially my father,” Mrs. Blackwell said when Sarah started to leave. “He came yesterday, and he made me cry, talking about Edmund. I don’t want to cry anymore. Please tell him I’m not able to see him.”

“Of course,” Sarah agreed, wondering how she would explain this to Mrs. Blackwell’s father. She left to check on the baby.

MALLOY WAITED IN the parlor for Sarah Brandt. She didn’t even say hello when she came in.

“So, Malloy, when do you plan to arrest the killer?” she asked instead, trying to nettle him.

He didn’t let on that she had succeeded. She was the only woman he knew who could look appealing while being infuriating. “I need to ask Mrs. Blackwell some questions. When can I see her?”

“My guess would be a few weeks,” she told him without a hint that she was teasing him. “She asked me a few moments ago to tell her own father she was too ill to receive him, so she’s certainly too ill to see you.”

“Is she?”

“If she says she is, then she is,” she informed him. “Would you dare impose yourself on a woman during her lying-in?”

Frank tried not to feel the irritation he was feeling, mostly because it wasn’t entirely unpleasant. He actually enjoyed arguing with Sarah Brandt, as difficult as that was to understand. “I need to find out what she knows about her husband’s death, and the sooner I do that, the better chance I have of finding the killer.”

“I would be happy to question her for you if you’ll just tell me what you need to know,” she said, taking a seat on the sofa and making herself comfortable.

“You are not a member of the police force, and you are not involved in this investigation,” he reminded her.

“Well, then, I suppose you won’t be interested in the fact that Mrs. Blackwell uses morphine.”

“What?” Although he hadn’t intended to, he sat down in the chair opposite her.

“Mrs. Blackwell has used morphine for several years, except for a brief period,” she said. “It seems she began using it when she was injured in a riding accident.”

“That’s the accident her husband cured her of, isn’t it?”

“Yes, it is.”

“What was wrong with her exactly?”

“She said her back and neck were injured.”

Frank frowned. “He cured her of a broken neck?”

“I doubt it. More likely, she sprained her back or pulled something. Such injuries can be extremely painful, and there is no effective treatment except bed rest and opiates for the pain. Sometimes they get better, and sometimes they don’t.”

“Except Blackwell knew of a treatment for it,” Frank reminded her.

“So it appears. From what his wife told me, I think Blackwell must have been a bonesetter.”

“A bone-setter? You mean he set broken bones?”

“Not exactly. I suppose in the old days, that’s what bonesetters did, back before the science of medicine was so advanced and doctors began setting bones themselves,” she said, and Frank managed not to snort in derision. His opinion of medicine wasn’t quite as high as hers. “Nowadays,” she continued, “bonesetters perform manipulations on bones that make people feel better.”

“What do you mean ‘manipulations’?”

“I mean they move the body around and somehow manage to make bones shift position, on the theory that they are somehow out of their proper position, which is what is causing the problems. I imagine that something in Mrs. Blackwell’s spine or neck was somehow out of line from the accident, and Blackwell managed to realign it, thus relieving her pain.”

“Is that possible?”

“Apparently. She said her pain was completely gone within a few weeks, after she’d been confined to her bed for almost a year.”

“How did you find out she uses morphine?” Frank asked.

“Her baby became ill because he was no longer receiving the drug from his mother. I recognized the symptoms.”

“You mean to tell me the woman gave her baby morphine?” Frank was horrified.

“Not directly,” she explained patiently. “He would have gotten the effects of the morphine through the umbilical cord before he was born. Once he was born, he would no longer receive it. Sometimes, the baby receives enough of the drug through his mother’s milk to satisfy the craving, but Mrs. Blackwell chose to use a wet nurse, so after about a day, he was desperate for the drug and showing all the signs of deprivation. He would have died without it, so I gave him a small dose of opium to ease his suffering.”

“You let him have morphine?” Frank asked, horrified all over again.

She sighed with long-suffering. She always found Frank unreasonable, although he could never understand why. “My choice was to either give him the drug or watch him die in agony. What would you have done?”

Frank chose not to reply to that. “All right, so Mrs. Blackwell uses morphine. That’s unusual for a woman of her social class, but-”

“It’s not as unusual as you might suppose,” she disagreed. “Many women of her social class use opiates of some sort.”

“What on earth for?” He could understand why the poor used stimulants like alcohol and opiates to help them forget the grim realities of their existence, but what could a woman like Mrs. Blackwell need to forget?

“There are all kinds of pain, Malloy. Life can be hard even if you’re rich.”

He didn’t bother arguing with her. It was usually a waste of time, even when he knew she was wrong. “All right, so she uses morphine. What does that have to do with her husband’s death?”

“Her husband didn’t know she was still using it. He knew she’d given it up after he cured her, even though it was very difficult for her. Have you ever seen anyone going through the process of weaning himself off an opiate? Few people ever manage to do it. But then he forced her to speak at his lectures. He gave lectures to promote-”

“I know all about his lectures,” Frank said. “His assistant explained it to me, but he said Mrs. Blackwell was only too pleased to give her testimony of what the good doctor had done for her.”

“Mrs. Blackwell tells a different story. She hated speaking in public. It terrified her, but her father and Blackwell forced her to do it.”

“How could they force her if she didn’t want to do it?”

“Really, Malloy, how do you force people to tell you things they don’t want to tell you?” she asked, that gleam in her eyes that made her look so wicked he thought he should probably lock her away before she could cause any more trouble.

“Are you telling me they gave her the third degree?” he asked, giving her trouble right back.

“Of course not. You should know there are more effective ways of managing someone like Mrs. Blackwell. Women of her class are taught from birth to be obedient and compliant and to please men.”

“You’re from her class,” he pointed out, reminding her that she had been born into one of the oldest and wealthiest families in the city. “What happened to you?”

She gave him one of her looks, but she didn’t dignify his words with a reply. “The important thing for you to know is that Mrs. Blackwell started using morphine again to help overcome her fear of appearing at those lectures. It was the only way she could do it. Her husband didn’t approve of her using morphine, and she must have lived in constant fear that he would discover her secret. She also hated speaking at his lectures, which was why she needed the morphine in the first place. I imagine she was excused from doing them once her condition became apparent, but surely, he would have expected her to resume her appearances once the child was born. In fact, she told me he’d forbidden her to nurse the child herself because she had to be free to attend those lectures.”

“Maybe you’ll tell me why you think all this is important?” he tried, knowing it would annoy her to think he hadn’t figured it out.

He was right. “Malloy, I’m surprised at you! Mrs. Blackwell might have thought the only way to avoid being discovered as a morphine user and having to speak at those lectures again was to murder her husband.”

He almost hated to show her how weak her theory was. “You think a woman who was so frightened she’d take morphine to give her the courage to stand up in front of a crowd is going to have the courage to pick up her husband’s pistol, put it to his head, and blow his brains all over her nice carpet?”

“Desperation can make people do strange things,” she pointed out.

“Next I suppose you’re going to argue that she wasn’t in her right mind because of her delicate condition.”

“I’m sure that’s what she’d argue-if she’s guilty, that is.”

“I can’t see any jury in the world convicting a woman with a baby in her arms. That’s even if her father allowed it to get that far. I can’t believe he would.”

“Who is her father?”

“His name is Symington.”

“Maurice Symington?” she asked with a frown.

“Probably. Do you know him?”

“I’ve heard of him, and my father knows him, I’m sure. I think he made his money in manufacturing.”

“You mean he owns sweatshops?”

“That’s exactly what I mean. I’m surprised he allowed his daughter to marry so far beneath her, unless Dr. Blackwell comes from money, too.”

“He doesn’st,” Frank said.

“Well, then,” she said, as if that proved everything. “Now I’m really surprised the father allowed her to appear at Dr. Blackwell’s lectures. Such a public display would surely be offensive to him.”

“I figured the same thing. Do you think Blackwell had something on the old man?”

“Looking for blackmail as a motive, Malloy?” she teased: “Sorry to disappoint you, but Mrs. Blackwell said they just felt they owed Blackwell a huge debt after what he did for her. He wouldn’t even accept payment for treating her, and every other doctor had completely given up on helping her. It seems reasonable they would feel deeply grateful and obligated.”

“Maybe,” was all he would allow. Something about this case bothered him. Probably it was the idea that the man might have been done in by his own son. Frank found that very unsettling. He certainly didn’t want to hear that the wife had done it instead, an even more unsettling idea.

“Or maybe she had a lover who took matters into his own hands,” she suggested. “He would have the same motive as she, but he’d also have the will and the nerve to actually kill Dr. Blackwell.”

“Do women of her class usually take lovers?” he asked, ashamed to admit that she might actually have come up with a good possibility. He hadn’t yet seen Mrs. Blackwell, so he couldn’t judge her character.

She considered this for a moment. “No, they don’t. In fact, a woman from that class in society who is known to have taken a lover becomes a social outcast. It’s simply too dangerous to risk.”

Frank gave her a murderous frown for getting his hopes up, but she simply shrugged apologetically.

“All right, Malloy, you told me you’d have the killer locked up yesterday. If Mrs. Blackwell and her imaginary lover didn’t do it, who did? That harmless little man, Mr. Potter?” she asked sarcastically.

“Never assume anyone is innocent, Mrs. Brandt. That’s the best way to end up looking foolish.”

She opened her mouth to say something that was probably outrageous, when someone knocked on the door, distracting them both.

“Yes?” Frank called.

The parlor doors opened, and Amos Potter stepped in. “Excuse me, but I was wondering how Mrs. Blackwell is doing.”

Sarah Brandt smiled sweetly, probably thinking Potter was merely a concerned friend of the family. Frank had a feeling Potter’s interest in Mrs. Blackwell was more than just friendly, however. He was just too solicitous.

“Mrs. Blackwell is just fine,” Sarah said, “although she’s very tired and has asked not to be disturbed anymore today.”

“Oh, I wasn’t planning on disturbing her,” he hastily assured her. “I’m sure I wouldn’t dream of… I mean, well, I did want to let her know the plans for Edmund’s funeral, of course. We must have some sort of wake. He has many admirers, and his patients will want to pay tribute to him for all he’s done.”

“When were you planning to have the funeral?” Frank inquired, thinking this would be a good opportunity to look at all of Blackwell’s acquaintances at once. The person who killed him would most likely be among them, unless his son really was the killer. In that case, Calvin Brown wouldn’t very likely be in attendance since he would probably be a thousand miles away by now.

“I thought we’d have it tomorrow, since it’s Saturday and… Well, that is, I already put it in the newspaper, so we will have it here tomorrow at ten o’clock. Just a small memorial service, you understand. There won’t be a viewing, of course. I mean, under the circumstances, and with poor Edmund… Well, in any case, people need an opportunity to mourn. I know Mrs. Blackwell won’t be able to attend, but I’m sure it will be a comfort to her knowing Edmund is being honored appropriately.”

Not necessarily, Frank thought cynically, but he said, “Shouldn’t you have checked with Mrs. Blackwell before making arrangements to have an event in her home?”

Potter seemed offended at the very suggestion. “Mr. Symington told me to proceed with the arrangements. I felt that was all the authority I needed. I assure you, Mrs. Blackwell will not be troubled in the slightest. Her well-being is my foremost concern, and I would never do anything that might cause her distress.”

Frank could believe that. The man seemed extraordinarily concerned with Mrs. Blackwell’s well-being. “I appreciate the opportunity to meet Dr. Blackwell’s friends and associates,” Frank said. “It should help me in my investigation.”

Potter’s round face grew red. “It would not be appropriate for you to question people during a funeral, Mr. Malloy. No one there will know anything anyway. You’d do better using your time to search for young Calvin.”

“Who’s Calvin?” Mrs. Brandt asked, and Frank winced. He’d been trying to keep her out of this, and now Potter had hooked her right in.

Frank considered trying to brush off her question, but she’d never allow that. He could tell by the expression on her face that she was like a hound on the scent now. In any case, Potter was already telling her everything she needed to know.

“Calvin Brown. He’s a young man who had a… a certain grudge against Dr. Blackwell. I believe he is the one who killed Edmund,” he added with more authority than he had any right to feel. At least he hadn’t given her all the dirty gossip, Frank thought.

She turned to Frank expectantly. “If this man is the killer, why haven’t you arrested him yet?”

“Because no one knows where he is,” Frank replied, managing not to sound testy. It was a pure act of will.

“Oh, my, that is inconvenient, isn’t it?” she asked without a hint of sympathy.

“Very,” Frank agreed.

“If you could find him, you probably could have arrested him yesterday by, oh, I don’t know, say by nightfall,” she said.

Frank gave her a thin smile that she returned with a smirk.

“Oh, yes,” Potter was saying, although no one was paying him any particular attention, “I’m sure this boy is the one who killed poor Edmund. He had an appointment with him that afternoon, and no one else was even in the house at that time. The servants had the afternoon off, and Mrs. Blackwell was out doing her visits. Who else could it have been? And now, of course, he’s nowhere to be found. I’m sure that proves his guilt, the fact that he’s vanished. Don’t guilty men usually flee?” he asked Frank.

“If they can,” Frank replied. At least Mrs. Brandt would think the killer was beyond their reach. Maybe she would lose interest in the case or maybe there wasn’t really a case at all. Either possibility would keep her out of it.

This pleasant thought was interrupted by a commotion out in the hallway.

“What on earth?” Potter muttered, but Frank beat him to the door.

When he slid it open, he saw Granger confronting a roughly dressed boy of about sixteen who seemed determined to gain entry into the house over Granger’s equally determined efforts to keep him out.

“There is a police officer here,” Granger was saying with unmistakable warning. “Must I summon him?”

“Summon whoever you want, you old windbag,” the boy said. “I come to see my father, and I ain’t leaving until you tell him I’m here!”

“What’s going on here?” Frank demanded, and Granger half turned to acknowledge him.

“This young man is obviously at the wrong house,” he told Frank. “He insists on seeing his father, even though I have assured him there is no such person here. He was here the other day, too, and I had to run him off then as well.”

Frank looked the boy over. “What’s your name, son?”

The boy pulled himself up to his full height, making him still half a head shorter than Granger. “My name is Calvin Brown.”