Murder on St. Mark’s place

5

“WHICH ONE?”

Sarah looked again. The man was turned away now, speaking to his companion, a young girl who couldn’t seem to stop giggling. Sarah couldn’t be certain, but he looked like one of the Schyler boys. Then he turned to pose for the photographer who had commanded them all to look suitably frightened for the picture, and she was sure.

“Dirk Schyler,” she told Malloy. “His family and mine have known each other forever.”

“Knickerbockers,” Malloy said with disapproval, referring to the nickname for the wealthy old Dutch families who had been the original settlers of New York City.

“Don’t say it like it’s an insult, Malloy,” she chided him. “Some people are proud of being a Knickerbocker family.”

He knew she wasn’t, of course, so he just gave her one of his looks, which she ignored.

They watched as the people in the boat posed, trying to look frightened, and the photographer snapped the picture.

“What do you suppose the son of a Knickerbocker family is doing at Coney Island with a shop girl?” Malloy mused aloud.

Sarah had been wondering the same thing. Dirk was helping the girl out of the boat now, and they could see the cheapness of her outfit and the tawdriness of her accessories. She didn’t appear to be more than sixteen, either. Dirk himself was dressed the part of a Coney Island swain in a plaid suit and a straw boater, which was amazing in itself. Someone of Dirk’s station in life would never be seen in such a costume, or so Sarah would have thought.

All this actually made Sarah doubt her own judgment for a moment, but she waited until the couple was within earshot, and she called, “Dirk!”

Sure enough, his head jerked around in surprise. When he saw Sarah staring back at him, he didn’t seem to recognize her at first. His surprise slid into confusion and then, just for a moment, alarm, as recognition dawned. She hadn’t seen him in years, but they had been children together, sharing the agonies of dancing classes and tea parties. He knew her now and for just that second had been horrified to know she had seen him here, like this.

She understood it all in the second before his expression twisted itself into the semblance of delighted surprise, the kind he would have genuinely felt to have encountered her while dining at Delmonico’s in the city, for example. He leaned down and spoke to his companion, who shot a look in Sarah’s direction, plainly ready to object to his leaving her, even for an instant. But then she saw Sarah and recognized that someone of Sarah’s advanced years could not be a threat to her, and besides, Sarah already had Malloy for an escort. Reluctantly, she released the arm to which she had been clinging possessively and allowed him to make his way over to Sarah and Malloy.

“Sarah, is that you?” he asked, his features now schooled into the proper combination of amazement and pleasure.

“It certainly is. How have you been, Dirk?” she asked, taking the hand he offered.

He clasped hers in both of his, holding it fast while they exchanged pleasantries about the health of their respective families. Sarah thought she was going to have to pull it free by force until she realized she could simply introduce him to her companion instead.

“Are you enjoying the sights?” Dirk was asking politely, plainly expecting her to deny it. His eyes were dancing with the assumption of a shared contempt for the amusements found here.

“Very much,” Sarah said truthfully. “I was just trying to convince Mr. Malloy to take me on the Shoot-the-Chutes.”

“Malloy?” Dirk said with some amazement, as if the name were some foreign language he didn’t quite recognize. His tone told her he was shocked at the idea of her consorting with an Irishman, but at least he released her hand at last to shake hands with Malloy.

“Frank Malloy, Dirk Schyler,” Sarah said, offering Dirk no more information about Malloy, even though his curiosity was obvious.

“Do you come here a lot, Schyler?” Malloy asked him with all the subtlety of a police interrogator.

Dirk was taken aback by his bluntness, but he couldn’t quite bring himself to refuse to answer. That would have been beyond rude, and Dirk had been bred to obey the rules of etiquette as if they held the force of law. “I… now and again,” was all he would admit. “I find it… amusing.”

Malloy glanced meaningfully at the girl, who was waiting with increasing impatience for his return. “Yes, she looks… amusing.”

Sarah wanted to smack him. Certainly, Dirk’s ill-disguised contempt for Malloy was annoying, but insulting him back wouldn’t get them anywhere.

The girl saw them looking at her, and she called, “Will you come on?” to Dirk, who replied with a placating wave, indicating he’d join her in a moment.

“We were just wondering if this ride is dangerous,” Sarah asked, drawing his attention back to her. “I couldn’t get Mr. Malloy to take me on the Flip-Flap Railway. He was afraid we’d fall out.” She smiled sweetly, knowing Malloy would probably like to choke her for saying such a thing.

“Oh, there’s no need to worry, old man,” Dirk assured him generously, plainly delighted to gain an advantage over Malloy. “Everything here is perfectly safe. The Flip-Flap relies on centrifugal force to keep people in their seats. Works just like gravity, don’t you know?”

Malloy didn’t know any such thing, but he wasn’t going to show weakness in front of Dirk. “That’s what I heard,” he lied.

“And the boat ride here”-Dirk gestured toward the Shoot-the-Chutes-“is quite a thrill, but not dangerous at all. And you’ll like the beginning of the ride even better than the ending. It’s a very different kind of thrill, especially with a companion like our lovely Sarah.”

Malloy didn’t like the suggestive tone of Dirk’s voice. Sarah could tell by the way his neck got red. But for once in his life he held his tongue, thank heaven.

“I’m afraid you might have the wrong idea, Dirk,” she hastened to explain. “Mr. Malloy and I are here on Coney Island for business.”

“Business?” He looked at Malloy again, as if trying to imagine what kind of business he might be in. “Police business, by any chance?”

Sarah was surprised he’d guessed so quickly, but Malloy wasn’t. The two men understood each other perfectly.

“Not all Irishmen are coppers,” Malloy reminded him.

“And not all coppers are Irishmen anymore, are they?” Dirk countered. “I heard my old friend Teddy has even hired some Jews to police our fair city. But no one would mistake you for one of them, Officer Malloy.”

“Detective Sergeant Malloy,” Malloy corrected him.

Dirk’s eyebrows rose, and Sarah thought he might have paled a bit, but perhaps she only imagined it. In any case, they were all distracted by the sudden appearance of the young lady Dirk had left standing nearby while he conversed with them.

“You promised me some ice cream!” she reminded him, shooting Sarah a look meant to freeze her blood. The girl was even younger than Sarah had thought, but her eyes were old with experience, just as Lisle’s were.

“So I did, my dear,” he said, tucking her hand into the crook of his arm and patting it soothingly. “I’m afraid I must excuse myself now. Sarah, it was so nice to see you. Malloy, enjoy the ride.”

His smirk was knowing as he steered the girl away. Sarah turned on Malloy.

“That was a fine job,” she said as soon as Dirk was out of earshot.

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about all that male posturing,” Sarah said furiously. “The two of you were like schoolboys, puffing out your chests and trying to see who could be King of the Mountain.”

“You’re crazy!”

“No, I’m angry!” she corrected him. “If you hadn’t insisted on taking offense, I might have gotten some information out of him.”

“Information about what?” he scoffed.

“About Coney Island and what goes on here. It’s obvious he comes here often.”

“Yes, and you know why he comes here, don’t you?”

“Of course. To meet shop girls.”

“He does more than meet them,” Malloy said, his expression hardening.

“I’m sure he does. He buys them treats and takes them on the rides, and they reward him with their favors. It’s the kind of exchange that goes on all over the city every day.”

“And maybe he even buys them things, like hats. Or red shoes.”

That silenced Sarah, but only for a moment. “Dirk isn’t a killer.”

“Why not? Because you know him?”

Sarah remembered she had known the killer of Alicia VanDamm, too, and it had been someone she had never suspected.

“All right, Malloy, you win. Dirk could be the killer just as easily as every other man here.”

“Maybe even more easily than some. He doesn’t have to come all the way out here for female companionship. And why would he dress like a dry-goods salesman and prowl around a place where he’ll probably never see anyone who knows him?”

“Because the female companionship of girls of his own class would be heavily chaperoned. A liaison with one of them would be impossible. He’s probably dressed the way he is so none of the girls will suspect he’s wealthy and try to blackmail him. And he certainly doesn’t want any of his friends to know how he satisfies his baser urges. Keeping a mistress would be perfectly acceptable in their eyes, but apparently, Dirk doesn’t want to go to the trouble.”

“Or the expense, maybe.”

Sarah shook her head. “He could keep a woman if that’s what he wanted. I’m sure his father would provide for him if he knew the alternative was to have him consorting with the trash he’d consider these girls to be.”

“Maybe this is his way of rebelling. Maybe he hopes you’ll go back and tell everyone you saw him here. Maybe he wants to embarrass his family.”

Sarah didn’t know what Dirk’s motives were, and she really didn’t care, but she did know she could learn a lot from him. But not when Malloy was around. She’d have to seek him out when she got back to the city.

“Well, Malloy, since you cost me a chance to find out something from Dirk, you have to take me on the Shoot-the-Chutes.”

“What?”

“You heard me. Or are you going to make me go alone?”

“What would you want to go on that thing for?” He stared at the contraption in horror as yet another boat came splashing down into the artificial lagoon.

“I want to find out everything I can about Gerda Reinhard’s last days, and on the last Sunday of her life, she rode on that ride. Now, are you coming or do I have to find another escort?”

He opened his mouth, ready with another argument, but Sarah beat him to it.

“You’re not afraid, are you?” she challenged.

Of course he was, but he’d die before he admitted it. Sarah knew that, and she managed not to grin with triumph when he grabbed her elbow and determinedly steered her toward the line of people waiting to board the boats.

He was muttering something under his breath, and Sarah chose not to hear. It was easier than getting into ah argument. She could sympathize with his fear of mechanical contraptions. She wasn’t overly fond of them herself, but she was terribly curious to learn what Dirk had meant about the thrills on the first part of the ride.

They waited the better part of half an hour before they were handed into a boat. Malloy nearly upset the thing when he climbed in beside her, but the water was so shallow that truly upsetting was actually impossible.

“Easy there, sir,” the young boy assisting them cautioned, helping Malloy sit down on the seat beside her. They were crowded in with their knees pressing against the people on the seat in front of them and the knees of those behind them pressing against their backs.

Malloy shot her a reproachful look, but she simply smiled serenely.

When everyone was seated, the boat started with a jerk, and Sarah realized it was being propelled by some sort of motorized pulley device. They glided down the chute, and the next thing they knew, their boat was swallowed up by a tunnel.

“So this is what he meant!” Sarah whispered to Malloy as the darkness enveloped them.

In the sudden silence of the tunnel, where they were shielded from the raucous noises of the rest of the park, they could hear the sounds of rustling clothing and provocative giggling and even the smack of lips as the other couples in the boat took advantage of the momentary privacy for some hasty petting.

“If that’s all you wanted to know, I could’ve told you,” Malloy said, the disgust evident in his voice. “We didn’t have to get on this cursed thing.”

“At least try to enjoy yourself, Malloy,” she chided.

Just then the couple in front of them nearly toppled into their laps, and by the time they were all untangled, amid much giggling and cursing, the boat was emerging into the daylight again.

The couples discreetly stopped kissing, but they kept their arms around each other as the boat began to travel upward at an increasingly steep angle.

“Oh, my,” Sarah said as the ground fell away and the boat seemed to be going almost straight up into the air.

“I tried to warn you,” Malloy reminded her as she instinctively clutched at his arm for support, but by then she was too distracted to take offense.

What had she been thinking? This was insane! She could be killed! She most certainly would be killed! This flimsy boat would never withstand the impact she knew it would take when it went plummeting down the chute to splash into the water below. Malloy was right, but she would never have the opportunity to tell him so because suddenly the whole world was tipping over, and they were going down and down and down, faster and faster, until a scream was literally ripped from her throat, and she thought her very heart must be torn out with it. And just when she thought she couldn’t bear it another second, the boat hit the water with an impact that sent them slamming into their seats. The spray of water showered them, and then it was over, and they were gliding safely, surely to the shore, where men with grappling hooks were waiting to pull the boat in so they could disembark.

Only then did Sarah realize that in her terror she had thrown her arms around Malloy and that she was still clinging to him desperately.

“Oh!” she cried, mortified, and released him at once, except she couldn’t exactly release him because he was clinging to her, too, in equal desperation.

But his reaction was only an instant later than hers, and they sprang guiltily apart, or at least as far apart as they could get in the crowded boat. For a moment their gazes locked and they shared their mutual embarrassment, but a moment was all they could stand. They looked away, up or down or anywhere but at each other.

Good heavens, what had come over her? Sarah wasn’t clingy or helpless or at all the kind of woman to clutch at a man for anything. Or at least she wasn’t in the normal course of her life. The normal course of her life had not, until now, involved a terrifying plummet down a water-filled chute to what felt like certain and imminent death, however. That, apparently, changed her into a quivering mass of feminine weakness.

And it had turned Malloy into a quivering mass of male weakness, too, it seemed. He was the first one out of the boat when the attendant had secured it to the wooden wharf, and he let the attendant help her out, too. Which suited Sarah fine. She didn’t feel quite ready to have Malloy’s hands on her again.

She immediately changed her mind, however, when she discovered that her knees were trembling as she made her way toward the exit. She could have used a steady arm to support her, but one look at Malloy’s expression told her not even to consider it.

“That was certainly an experience, wasn’t it?” she managed, hoping her voice didn’t sound as breathless as she was afraid it did.

Malloy didn’t bother to respond.

Luckily, there was a vacant bench nearby, and Sarah and Malloy both plopped down on it. For a few moments they just sat there, staring at the people walking by. Sarah was waiting for her heart rate to return to normal, and she supposed Malloy was doing the same.

Finally, he said, “I hope you know who the killer is now, because I don’t think I can survive any more of this investigation.”

Sarah looked at him in amazement, but then she saw the glint of amusement in his dark eyes and realized he was teasing her. Malloy was teasing her! She knew it wasn’t funny, but she had an irresistible urge to laugh, and before she could stop herself she was laughing, and then Malloy was laughing, too. Or chuckling at least. And shaking his head and chuckling some more. She had never seen him laugh. It was so amazing, she laughed even harder, until she had to wipe the tears from her eyes and take some deep breaths to compose herself.

“Oh, Malloy, I’m sorry I put you through that,” she said when she could speak again. “I had no idea it would be so frightening. Everybody looked like they were having such a good time!”

“You thought they were screaming because it was so much fun?” he asked skeptically.

He had a point, but she didn’t give it to him. “And I’m sorry I behaved so… so foolishly. Clinging to you the way I did,” she added with chagrin when his look grew puzzled.

He nodded in understanding, then turned his head away, seemingly studying the passing throng for several moments. “I didn’t mind,” he said quite casually.

This time Sarah was dumbfounded. “Malloy, are you flirting with me?” she demanded, not at all displeased.

When he turned back to her, his expression was bland. “I thought you were flirting with me.”

Had she been? She thought back to her behavior throughout the day and realized she hadn’t been acting at all like herself, at least not the way she usually acted with Malloy. And he hadn’t been acting at all like himself, either, if the truth were told. They’d both been almost playful and slightly adventurous and much more informal than they had ever been in each other’s company.

“It’s this place, isn’t it?” she realized. “Here a person can break all the rules of propriety and not suffer any consequences!”

Malloy frowned, but she was too busy thinking aloud to notice.

“In the city, strangers don’t speak to each other, but here they offer advice as if they were dear friends. In the city, a man wouldn’t dare even tip his hat to a woman he didn’t know, but here he can introduce himself to a girl he’s never seen before, treat her to rides and buy her food and even kiss her in the darkness of the tunnels.”

Malloy was still frowning, but not in disapproval. He was thinking, too. “You’re right. People don’t act like themselves here,” he said. “No one knows them, so they don’t have to worry about what anyone else will think of them.”

“Which is why young people come here, so they can meet new people and have fun and their families won’t know what they’re doing. A girl can be forward and flirt and do things she wouldn’t dream of doing in her neighborhood where anyone might see her and ruin her reputation. Even going to the dance halls, a girl has to be a little careful because word might get back to her family, but not about what happens on Coney Island.”

“And men like your friend Dirk come out here to prey on those girls,” Malloy reminded her.

“Men of all kinds prey on them,” Sarah corrected him. She looked at the crowd passing down the midway before them, hundreds of people of every size and shape and age and status in life. Any one of them might have met Gerda Reinhard and treated her and tempted her and lured her to a dark corner and beaten the life out of her. “It’s hopeless, isn’t it?” she asked in despair.

“Finding the killer, you mean?”

She nodded glumly.

He sighed and watched the crowd with unseeing eyes while he considered. “If it was just one girl, then yes, it would be impossible.”

“But it wasn’t just one girl, was it?” How could she have forgotten? “There were three others! I found out their names from Gerda’s friends. I was going to tell you today, but in all the excitement, I forgot!”

He didn’t look at her. “They were Eva Bower, Luisa Isenberg, and Fredrika Lutz.”

“That’s right!” Sarah’s surprise quickly became anger. “You knew all along! You were just playing with me!”

“Don’t be a fool. I would’ve told you if I did.”

She supposed this was true, although she really had no way of knowing for sure. “Well, then, if you didn’t know their names before, how do you know them now?”

“I know Eva’s name because I worked on her case. She was the first one, as near as I can figure, which is why nobody thought it was anything out of the ordinary. Just another girl who took up with the wrong man and got beaten to death for her mistake.”

“You didn’t investigate?” Sarah was outraged.

Malloy just gave her one of his long-suffering looks. “She was just like this Gerda. She’d known dozens of men, and the ones we could find all had alibis. Nobody saw it, nobody knew anything, nobody cared.”

“But what about the others! Why didn’t you start questioning their friends to find out what men they all knew in common?”

“I didn’t know about the others until you told me the other day, remember?”

“But you know their names now!”

“Only because you told me other girls had been killed. I started asking around, and that’s when I found out about the other two cases. Two different detectives had them, and they didn’t know about any of the others, either.”

“How could this happen? Don’t policemen talk to each other?” Sarah was incredulous.

Malloy rubbed the bridge of his nose, as if he were getting a headache. “We talk to each other about important cases.”

“And the deaths of four girls isn’t important?” Sarah cried, but she didn’t need Malloy’s pitying look to remind her that no, these deaths weren’t very important in the grand scheme of things. No one outside their families cared about them, and none of their families had the money or connections necessary to ensure a thorough investigation. Even with all the resources money could buy at their disposal, the police were unlikely to solve any single one of these murders, simply because the pool of suspects was so very large.

But now Sarah saw a way to surmount all these difficulties. “The deaths of four girls is important if we can prove they were all killed by the same man, especially since he’s likely to kill again.”

“We don’t know the murders were committed by one man,” Malloy pointed out reasonably.

This time Sarah was the one giving the pitying look. “Oh, Malloy, I thought we already settled that. All the girls had been to a dance hall, and they were all killed the same way in the same neighborhood. How many men do you think are skulking around the city beating young women to death?”

“More than you’d like to imagine, I’m sure,” Malloy said. “And even if one man did kill all these girls, we don’t have any reason to think he’ll kill again.”

“How can you say that? He’s gotten away with it four times! He must think he’s invincible by now. If anything, he’ll start to kill more often!”

“What makes you such an expert on the criminal mind, Mrs. Brandt?” he asked sourly.

Sarah couldn’t resist. “All the training I’ve received from a very wise police detective.”

Malloy’s expression was priceless, but Sarah didn’t gloat. She merely smiled serenely.

Malloy finally found his tongue. “Do you feel up to walking back to the trolley station now? I’ve had enough of this place.”

“So have I,” Sarah agreed. “On the way back to the city, we can discuss how we’re going to proceed with our investigation.”

SARAH WAS ACTUALLY quite surprised that Malloy had agreed to allow her to help investigate the murders. She’d only been teasing him when she suggested they work out a system, but he had been willing-if not eager-for her to assist him. Apparently, the investigation into the murders of all the other girls had been abandoned just as Malloy had abandoned his, and for the same reasons. Sarah suspected that Malloy felt a bit guilty for not trying harder to solve the case that had been his originally, even though they both agreed the task had been hopeless with only one victim. Now, of course, they had a way of narrowing down the list of suspects.

Sarah had planned to begin with Gerda’s sister first thing the next day, but an early morning call delayed her. By the time she’d brought a healthy baby boy safely into the world, it was late in the afternoon. Men were returning to their homes carrying their now empty lunch pails, and the smells of thousands of suppers being prepared filled the hot, summer air as thunderclouds gathered overhead. At least a storm might break the oppressive heat.

Sarah hated to intrude on the Otto family at this time of day, and she certainly didn’t want to encounter Lars Otto again, but she also didn’t want to lose any more time in her quest to find Gerda’s killer. Maybe she could catch Agnes before her husband came home from work.

She climbed the dark stairs to the Ottos’ flat, the heat from dozens of cooking stoves turning the stairwell into a giant oven. The two older Otto children were playing on the landing, the boy entertaining the girl as best he could, probably trying to keep her out of their mother’s way. Young as he was, he could understand that his mother didn’t need any distractions just now.

Sarah could see Agnes sitting in her kitchen through the door that stood open to catch whatever air might be stirring, superheated though it might be. Agnes was listlessly rolling out dough for biscuits. On the floor beside the table sat a cradle which she was rocking with one of her slippered feet. Inside the cradle lay the new baby, clad only in a ragged diaper. She looked no healthier than she had the last time Sarah saw her, and she was mewling pitifully. Agnes appeared oblivious to the child’s complaints.

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Otto,” Sarah called, startling her.

When Agnes turned to face her, Sarah was startled in turn by how haggard she looked. Like a dishrag that had been thoroughly wrung out. Sweat had dampened the hair around her face, her lips had little color, and her eyes were red-rimmed and dark-circled. Sarah instantly diagnosed anemia and no relief from the postnatal depression. Agnes’s condition was alarming, but the baby was in even more danger.

“Mrs. Brandt?” Agnes said after a moment, as if she needed that time to properly identify her visitor. “Why are you here? Is it Mrs. Gertz’s time?”

Sarah smiled. “Not that I know of. I was just in the neighborhood and thought I’d stop by and see how you’re doing. The little one seems unhappy.”

Agnes glanced down at the cradle she still rocked automatically, as if the action of her foot was independent of the rest of her body. Only then did she appear to become aware of the child’s misery.

“She is so good, I hardly remember she is there,” the new mother said, picking the baby up out of the cradle with little tenderness.

Sarah thought it more likely she hardly noticed, but she said nothing, waiting for Agnes to offer the child her breast. Instead, she tried bouncing the baby, as if that would soothe her cries.

Sarah’s fear was a tight ball in her stomach, but she tried not to show it. In her fragile state, Agnes probably wouldn’t be able to tolerate any perceived criticism of her mothering. Making her feel attacked would only harden her against the child. “She might be hungry,” Sarah suggested mildly.

The baby was rooting frantically, digging her face fruitlessly into the bodice of her mother’s dress, looking for milk. “I do not have time now. I have to finish supper,” Agnes said, laying the babe back in the cradle. “Lars will be angry if his supper is not ready when he comes home.”

The child’s little face was pinched and red, but she appeared too weak to cry any harder than the small, pitiful sounds she was making. Sarah knew what was happening. The baby wasn’t getting enough attention or sustenance, and she would die. Not today or tomorrow, but eventually. She wouldn’t grow, wouldn’t fatten, would shrivel and grow sickly and die. Sarah had seen it happen often enough. Too many unwanted babies seemed to recognize their fate and choose oblivion to further suffering. Some might say they were better off dead than alive in a world that didn’t want them, but not Sarah. Sarah hated death. Too many tiny lives had ended from injury and disease already. In the city, one in every three infants died from any number of reasons. Sarah never surrendered those in her care easily, and she wasn’t going to stand by helplessly and allow this one to go for no good reason at all.

“I can keep an eye on the other children and finish making those biscuits while you take the baby into the front room and nurse her. I’m prescribing some rest and relaxation for you.” She smiled with what she hoped looked like kindness, and prayed Agnes wouldn’t sense her desperation.

But Agnes was far too withdrawn into her own anguish even to notice Sarah’s expression, much less to divine her intentions. For a long moment she simply stared at the half-flattened dough ball sitting on the table in front of her, as if she were trying to remember what she had been doing with it.

“Lars will be angry,” she repeated. “He wants his supper waiting when he comes home.”

“He won’t like listening to a crying baby, either,” Sarah said. “I can roll out biscuits as well as you.”

That might be a lie, but Sarah felt no guilt in telling it. Instead she waited patiently while Agnes considered the possible ramifications and the baby continued to whimper. Finally, Agnes pulled herself to her feet. Her faded house-dress hung on her, and Sarah was amazed at how quickly she had lost the extra weight from her pregnancy. In fact, she was too thin, as if she were starving herself as well as the child.

Sarah was so concerned about Agnes’s weight loss that she almost didn’t notice the way she clutched at her side when she rose, as if she felt a pain there.

“Are you all right?” Sarah asked, automatically reaching to help her.

Agnes recoiled, cringing as if in fear of a blow, but then seemed to catch herself. She straightened, pride overcoming her obvious discomfort. “I am fine.”

“Your side hurts,” Sarah said, mentally nmning through a list of possible complications from the pregnancy. She couldn’t think of anything offhand that would cause pain up high on Agnes’s side, though. “I’d be happy to examine you and see if-”

“It is nothing,” Agnes insisted. “Just a bruise. I… I fall out of bed. Ja, I fall out of the bed. In the night. It was foolish. Like a little child. I have the bad dreams still. About Gerda.”

Sarah nodded. She sometimes had dreams about her dead sister, too, even though Maggie had been gone for more than a decade. Maggie, who had died bringing a child into the world. Maggie who had taught Sarah to hate death with a vengeance and fight it at every turn.

“Go on now and lie down. Feed the baby and get a little rest. I’ll get the biscuits in the oven for you.”

Agnes’s expression was heartbreakingly pitiful as she struggled with emotions Sarah couldn’t begin to understand. Finally, she said, “I cannot pay you.”

“I don’t charge people for doing them a favor,” Sarah replied gently. “Please get some rest. If you get sick after having a baby that I delivered, it will hurt my reputation,” she added with a small smile.

Agnes didn’t appreciate Sarah’s attempt at humor, but she allowed Sarah to pick the baby up and place her in her arms.

“I forgot to ask what you’d named her,” Sarah said.

Agnes glanced down at the child, as if she needed to remind herself. “Marta,” she said after a moment. “After Lars’s mother. I wanted to call her Gerda, but-” Her voice broke, and Sarah was afraid she would collapse if she didn’t get into bed soon.

With professional efficiency, Sarah guided her patient to her unmade bed and tucked her into it, making sure the baby was suckling properly before leaving them. She checked on the other two children, who were still playing so quietly Sarah found it disturbing. They stared at her with large, wary eyes when she told them their mother was resting, but they didn’t make a sound. She remembered Malloy’s silent son and wondered for a moment… But then she recalled hearing them speak on earlier visits and realized that they were most likely simply cowed by things they couldn’t understand.

Sarah made short work of the biscuits. She was afraid she’d added too much flour to the dough, but she hated when it stuck to the rolling pin. She hated everything about dough, in fact. It was either sticky and messy or powdery and messy. She cut the biscuits with the top of a drinking glass, found a sheet of tin to bake them on, and stuck them in the oven. By then her clothes were damp and her face running with sweat. All that work, and she still hadn’t so much as asked Agnes a single question about her sister.

She was just cleaning up the last of the flour from the kitchen table when she heard footsteps on the stairs and cries of, “Papa! Papa!” Lars Otto must be home, and he’d be annoyed because his supper wasn’t ready. He’d probably be even more annoyed to find Sarah there. She steeled herself to face him.

Lars Otto called something in German, something that sounded a bit angry to Sarah, as he stepped through the doorway, his small daughter perched on one hip while his son proudly carried his father’s lunch pail in with both hands. His work clothes were dirty, probably stained with dried blood from the animals he butchered, but he’d made some attempt to clean himself up before coming home. He stopped short when he saw Sarah and frowned.

“Something is wrong with Agnes?” he asked, apparently more angry than concerned. Or maybe he was just one of those men who hid his finer feelings behind anger. Sarah hoped that was true.

“She’s very tired, and she still hasn’t recovered from the birth. I’m worried about her and the baby. Marta isn’t thriving and-”

“Why should you worry about the baby? That is not your job.”

“I’m a trained nurse, Mr. Otto. I treat sick babies as well as their mothers.”

“Is Marta sick?” Plainly, he believed she was not.

“She will be soon if her mother doesn’t recover her strength. She’s not getting enough to eat. You could try giving her canned milk, but babies rarely do well on that. I’d suggest-”

“Agnes will feed this baby just like she fed the others,” he interrupted her, outraged. “We have no money to waste on milk from a store!”

“I don’t want that, either. Mother’s milk is best, in any case, but Agnes-”

“Did Agnes send for you?” he demanded, setting his daughter down. The little girl was starting to cry, upset at seeing adults argue.

“No,” Sarah admitted. “I just stopped by to see how she was doing.”

“I will not pay you for this visit,” he informed her haughtily. “We did not send for you, and nothing is wrong here.”

“Something is very wrong, Mr. Otto. Your wife is mourning her sister, and she isn’t able to properly take care of the baby.”

“Lars?” Agnes’s voice was hardly more than a whisper, and when Sarah turned to see her standing in the bedroom doorway, she was shocked at the look of naked terror on her face. “Your supper is almost ready.”

Only then did Sarah remember the biscuits, and when she looked, she saw a suspicious curl of smoke coming from the oven door. Quickly, she grabbed a towel and pulled the door open. The biscuits were just starting to burn, and Sarah was able to pull them out before any serious damage was done. Still, she could see that Lars wasn’t pleased. In fact, his face was scarlet.

“Now you are cooking in my house?” he asked her.

“I was just helping Agnes so she could get some rest. She needs some time to mourn her sister and-”

“No one will mourn that woman here! She does not deserve any of our tears.” He glared at Agnes as if daring her to contradict him. She ducked her head like a whipped dog and scurried to put the now sleeping baby back in her cradle. Without looking up, she hurried to the stove and began dishing up something from the pot that had been simmering there.

“You will go now,” Lars told Sarah. “And do not come back here. We do not need a midwife any longer.”

Sarah decided not to mention the other reason for her visit, which was to see if Agnes had any useful information about Gerda’s male companions. Under the circumstances, she didn’t think he would be too pleased to know she was helping investigate Gerda’s death.

Not wanting to linger any more than Mr. Otto wanted her to stay, Sarah gathered her things. “If you need me, just let me know,” she told Agnes, but the woman gave no indication she even heard. She was too busy setting her husband’s meal on the table.

Sarah saw herself out, gratefully escaping into the busy street, where the air was marginally fresher, at least. She could feel her cheeks burning with indignation at the way Lars Otto had treated her. He could be excused for being angry at the scandal his sister-in-law had brought down on them, but he should be more understanding of his wife’s grief. He should at least feel concern for the health of his wife and his baby daughter, if nothing else. But Sarah knew that many men cared little for such things.

Agnes Otto was afraid of displeasing her husband, and she might well have good reason to be. Sarah would do nothing further to annoy him. At least that he would know about. And he certainly wouldn’t know if she questioned Gerda’s friends.

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