Murder on Washington Square

7

SATURDAY MORNING WAS PROBABLY A GOOD TIME TO catch her mother alone, Sarah thought. She’d made two promises to Mrs. Ellsworth, and seeing Webster Prescott was just the first. She’d also agreed to convince the bank not to fire Nelson. For that she’d need more than the gumption that had taken her into the World. For that she’d need Felix Decker. Since the best way to influence her father was through her mother, that’s where Sarah headed next.

As she rode the Sixth Avenue Elevated uptown, she wondered whether she’d made the right decision in going to Prescott. He’d seemed enthusiastic about her story and had promised to investigate. Of course, that might mean he’d come up with something even more outlandish than the reports of Nelson being a killer. It might even mean involving herself in this scandal. That was, however, a chance she’d been willing to take. If her good name was completely ruined in this cause and decent women no longer hired her to deliver their babies, she could always throw herself on her father’s mercy. He’d be only too glad to take her back into his home-and his control-once again, she thought grimly.

But she wouldn’t borrow trouble, as Mrs. Ellsworth would have advised her. She had to hope Malloy was making progress in finding Anna’s real killer. Meanwhile, she’d do what she could to make sure this terrible situation wasn’t any worse for Nelson than it already had been and that he had a job to return to when he could safely leave his house again.

Her parents lived on Fifty-Seventh Street, not far from the Plaza Hotel and Marble Row on Fifth Avenue, home to the more ostentatious of the wealthy. The Deckers’ town house appeared modest on the outside, which suited them. They had always been modest about their wealth.

The maid seemed surprised to see her, since few members of society were stirring at this hour, but she admitted her and escorted her to the back parlor, which was the comfortable room the family used. In a few minutes, the maid came back, alone.

“Your mother asked me to take you up to her room, since she isn’t dressed yet,” the girl said.

Sarah smiled. Her mother must be appalled that Sarah was not only dressed but out and about so early on a Saturday, although by most people’s standards, it wasn’t early at all. She followed the maid up the stairs and down the corridor. Her mother’s voice bid her enter when the girl knocked.

Elizabeth Decker looked like a girl herself, draped in a silk dressing gown and half reclining on her settee. Her golden hair lay loose on her shoulders, and in the dimly lit room, the silver strands weren’t visible. Neither were the fine lines that the years had etched on her lovely face, and the smile of greeting she gave Sarah banished any lingering illusion of age.

“Sarah, how delightful to see you!” she said, reaching up to return Sarah’s kiss of greeting.

Her mother’s cheek was soft beneath her lips, and Sarah felt a rush of fond memories at the touch. Memories of happier days, long before she and her sister had grown old enough to see the world the way it really was and to rebel against the lives they had been bred to assume.

“What urgent business has brought you out at this unfashionable hour?” her mother asked, bringing her back to the present.

“What makes you think I have urgent business?” Sarah asked, seating herself on the slipper chair beside her mother. The room was decorated in shades of rose, with elaborately carved cherry wood furnishings. The color, Sarah realized, was very flattering to a woman of a certain age, especially when the morning light was filtered through it.

“I don’t want to sound accusing, but it seems the only time you come to visit me is when you need my assistance in one of your wild escapades,” she chided.

“Oh, Mother, I-”

“I’m not complaining, mind you,” her mother said, raising her hand to stop Sarah’s protest. “I suppose I should be glad you live such an interesting life. Otherwise, I might never see you at all. Now, what is it you want me to do?”

“Actually, it’s father’s help I need this time,” Sarah admitted.

Her mother sighed in feigned disgust. “So you’re only using me to influence your father,” she complained. “I might have known it would come to this. Really, Sarah, I’d think you’d learned your lesson. The last time you asked for our help, it ended very badly.”

Sarah winced, remembering just how badly. “No one is going to end up dead this time, I promise.”

“I should hope not! Mrs. Schyler won’t even speak to me anymore.”

“Oh, Mother, you never liked her anyway. She’s a terrible woman.”

“Yes, but you might alienate someone I do like if I’m not careful. Who is it you want to meet this time?”

“I’m not sure,” Sarah admitted.

“Not sure? Then how do you think your father can help?”

Sarah sighed. She’d have to tell her mother the whole story. “Well, you see, there’s been a murder…”

“Oh, Sarah, how do you manage to get involved in these things?” her mother cried in dismay. “I’m almost twice as old as you, and I’ve never even known anyone who was murdered!”

“I didn’t know this person either,” Sarah defended herself. “Not well, at least.”

Her mother put a hand to her forehead and shook her head sadly.

“My neighbor has been accused of killing her, you see and-”

“Oh, dear, stop right there. Let me ring for some tea. I can see this is going to be a long story, and I, for one, need fortification. Pull the bell, will you, dear?”

An hour later, Sarah and her mother were finishing up their tea and the last of the delicious pastries the cook had sent up with it, just as Sarah finished her story.

“I promised Mrs. Ellsworth I’d help Nelson keep his job at the bank, but I know there’s nothing I can do. If I walked in there and asked to see the president of the bank, they might let me in to see him, but he’d probably laugh right in my face or worse. It seems that when a woman takes an interest in helping a man, people always assume there is some romantic attachment between them. That’s not only annoying, but it also causes people to misinterpret the woman’s motives in trying to help.”

“You don’t have to instruct me in the ways of the world, Sarah. I understood them long before you were born. At least you have the good sense not to involve yourself in this. You could do this poor man more harm than good if you did. Can you imagine what the newspapers would say if they found out who your father is?”

Sarah simply nodded, knowing anything she said on the subject would upset her mother. She only hoped she never had to explain just how Webster Prescott had come to name her as Nelson Ellsworth’s paramour in The World.

“You were right to come to us,” her mother was saying. “I’m sure your father can speak to the president of this bank, whoever he is. Of course, if your friend is arrested for murder, I’m not sure even your father’s influence would save the man’s job.”

“My friend Mr. Malloy is working on the case. I’m sure he’ll find the real killer very soon,” Sarah said to reassure her.

Her mother looked far from reassured, however. “Are you still seeing that policeman, Sarah?”

“I was never seeing him, Mother,” Sarah said. “We are friends, nothing more.”

“An unmarried female can never be just friends with an unmarried man, not in the eyes of the world. You must know that yourself. Do you have any idea how easily such a relationship can be misconstrued?”

“Of course I do,” she insisted. “And believe me, there is nothing between us that could even be misconstrued.”

“I hope not. You know we didn’t approve of your marriage to Dr. Brandt. Not that we had anything against him, of course. He was a fine man. But you gave up everything for him, Sarah.”

“I didn’t give up anything I ever regretted losing,” Sarah said, ignoring the flash of pain the mention of her late husband caused.

Another kind of pain flashed in her mother’s eyes, but she chose not to dwell on it. “Even though we didn’t want to see you so reduced in circumstances, at least Dr. Brandt was a respectable man with an honest profession. But a policeman, Sarah? They’re worse than the criminals they deal with!”

Her mother was right; policemen were corrupt. Malloy was as honest as he could be, under the circumstances, but even that wouldn’t meet her mother’s standards. “You’re worrying for no reason, Mother. I have no intention of marrying Mr. Malloy, and he has no intention of marrying me.”

“I don’t see how he could have,” she said. “He’s Irish, isn’t he? They aren’t allowed to marry outside their faith.”

By “Irish,” she meant “Catholic,” and being Irish Catholic was a far greater sin in Elizabeth Decker’s eyes than being a dishonest policeman. Sarah wanted to chasten her for such prejudice, but she knew it would be a waste of breath and would only distract her from her real purpose in being here. “As I said, we aren’t going to marry, so it can’t possibly matter,” she said wearily.

Only then did she see the depth of concern in her mother’s blue eyes. “There are more things than that to worry about, dear. Be careful, Sarah. I know you’re lonely, and this man knows it, too. He’ll try to prey on that loneliness. Don’t let him deceive you, darling. Don’t be a fool.”

So that’s what her mother was really concerned about! Sarah should have been angry at her lack of faith, but the thought of Malloy as a sly seducer of lonely widows was so ludicrous, she could only laugh. And when she thought of Malloy’s mother and how she’d probably given him exactly the same warning about Sarah, she laughed harder.

Her mother stared at her incredulously. “Sarah?”

“Oh, mother, if you only knew… Believe me, you don’t need to worry about Malloy, not for one moment. My virtue and reputation are safe. In fact, they couldn’t be safer.”

Her mother frowned in confusion, but she didn’t press the matter. Sarah had either alarmed her or reassured her, but whichever it was, she was willing to let the subject drop.

“Is Father home today?” Sarah asked when she had composed herself.

“I believe he is. Let’s find out, shall we?”

She and her mother discussed society gossip, avoiding personal topics by unspoken consent, while they waited for a servant to summon her father. A few minutes later, he knocked on the door connecting their bedrooms, and her mother bid him enter.

“Sarah, you’re out early,” he said, coming over to kiss her forehead. He wore a dressing gown and a collarless shirt. Plainly, he’d had no plans this morning. He turned to his wife. “Good morning, my dear. You’re looking lovely.” He also kissed her on the forehead.

Sarah realized she’d never seen her parents embrace. They would think displays of affection unseemly, of course, but still, she liked to think they did at least sometimes display affection, however privately. Why this thought should occur to her at this particular moment in her life, however, she had no idea.

Her father seated himself on the slipper chair that matched hers. “To what mischance do we owe the honor of your visit this morning?” he asked her with a hint of a smile.

“Father, I don’t only visit you when I need help,” she reminded him.

“No, but you rarely call at dawn on Saturday morning, either,” he replied. “This must be urgent indeed.”

“Someone has been murdered,” her mother informed him with disapproval.

“Dare I ask who? Not someone we know, I hope.”

“Not his time,” her mother said. “A female of questionable morals, it would appear.”

“Then why do you care?” her father asked Sarah, even more disapproving than her mother.

“Because my neighbor has been accused of the crime,” Sarah said. “He’s innocent, but the newspapers have already pronounced him guilty, and they’re saying terrible things about him. Untrue things, and he’s probably going to lose his job if someone doesn’t do something.”

Her father frowned. “Is this that Ellsworth fellow I read about in the papers? They said he seduced some poor woman and killed her when she demanded that he make her an honest woman.”

“None of it is true,” Sarah said, and briefly gave him the facts as she knew them. “I believe we are going to find the real killer soon, but meanwhile the reporters have been hounding Nelson’s employers, and I’m afraid they’re going to let him go, innocent or not.”

“Who is this ‘we’ you mentioned?” her father asked.

“What?” Sarah asked in confusion.

“You said ‘we’ are going to find the killer. What did you mean? You aren’t involved with that policeman again, are you?”

Sarah sighed wearily. “Mother already warned me not to let him seduce me, Father. I promise you, you have nothing to worry about on that score. I only meant that Mr. Malloy is working to find the killer, and I am working to help the Ellsworths in whatever way I can. This is why I’ve come to you,” she quickly continued, before her parents could press the issue. “If Nelson loses his position at the bank under these circumstances, he’ll never get another one. He is the sole support of his elderly mother, who also happens to be a dear friend of mine. Someone needs to speak with his employer and convince him not to dismiss him, so I thought I would try to repay the many kindnesses Mrs. Ellsworth has done for me through the years by saving her son’s job, if I could.”

Her parents exchanged a glance, and some unspoken communication passed between them without either of them so much as batting an eye. Her father turned back to her, his expression resigned. “What is it you think I can do?”

Sarah managed not to let her feeling of triumph show. It would be unseemly to gloat. “Obviously, I can’t go into the bank and beg them not to dismiss Nelson.”

“Not without making herself a scandal,” her mother added.

“I was hoping you might have some influence with someone there who could-”

“Which bank is it?” he asked.

Sarah gave him the name.

He considered for a moment, then turned to his wife. “Young Dennis is in charge there,” he told her.

“Richard?” she said, her expression brightening.

“Yes, his father thought he should have some practical experience.”

“You know him, then?” Sarah asked.

“Very well. His father and I were partners in a business venture a few years ago.”

“Oh, Father, that’s wonderful! Would you be willing to approach him? I wouldn’t ask you if it wasn’t so important, but poor Mrs. Ellsworth is so frightened-”

“Of course, of course,” he said, dismissing Mrs. Ellsworth’s fears with a wave of his hand. “I don’t think it would be fair for me to approach him on this subject, however. He would certainly feel an obligation to do me this favor, although he might wonder about my motives. Ellsworth is a stranger to me, after all. And if things go badly for Ellsworth, poor Dennis would believe I’d taken advantage of our friendship to get him into an awkward situation. Even worse, he’d be right.”

Before Sarah could even register disappointment, her mother said, “But Sarah could argue his case, couldn’t she? I mean, if you were to arrange for them to meet. You could summon him here on a business matter, then introduce him to Sarah. He’d realize you were just doing a favor for your daughter, indulging her in this whim even though you didn’t really approve, but he’d still feel obligated to help because of his father’s association with you.”

“Yes,” Sarah agreed eagerly. “And if, heaven forbid, things do go badly for Nelson, you can simply apologize for indulging your foolish daughter and dragging him into it.”

“He’ll forgive you that, surely,” her mother said. “Men always understand when another man is imposed upon by a woman.”

Her father frowned. “Why do I feel I’m being imposed upon right now?”

“Because you are, dear,” her mother said with a sweet smile.

Sarah had just gotten back from delivering supper to the Ellsworths when someone knocked on her door. She smiled when she saw a familiar silhouette reflected through the frosted glass of the front door.

“Malloy,” she said in greeting as she opened the door, but her welcoming smile froze on her face when she saw his expression.

“I guess you haven’t seen the evening papers,” he said, holding up a copy of the World.

“No, I-” she began, but he brushed past her, not really interested in her reply. “Is it about Nelson?” she asked as she glanced out onto the street before closing the door. At least the reporters appeared to have gone for the day. Malloy probably wouldn’t have come to her front door if they hadn’t.

“Was this your idea?” he asked, thrusting the paper at her.

She stared at the headline: WANTON WOMAN DRIVES LOVER TO MURDER.

Skimming the article, she wanted to groan aloud. Webster Prescott had completely misunderstood her plea for help.

“He calls Anna Blake everything but a prostitute,” Malloy said. “Where did he get that idea? Every other paper still has her as an innocent victim.”

“I just told him Nelson didn’t kill her,” Sarah insisted. “I asked him to help me save him from being executed!”

“He just might,” Malloy said sourly, “if he can get the other papers to turn on Anna Blake, too.” He pulled off his bowler hat and hung it on her coat rack without waiting for an invitation to stay.

“But according to this, he’s still guilty of murder,” Sarah argued. “How can that help him?”

“Because Anna Blake is no longer innocent. She’s a harlot who seduced and blackmailed him and then threatened to kill his child unless he paid her. A woman like that deserves whatever she gets, and a lot of men would think she deserves to be murdered.”

“That’s ridiculous!” Sarah exclaimed.

“Is it? Have you forgotten what people said when Charity Girls were being murdered?”

A few months ago, she and Malloy had solved the murders of several girls who were so desperately poor that they sometimes traded their favors for a few trinkets. Because they went to dance halls and associated with young men, their deaths were ignored. As far as most people were concerned, they’d gotten what they deserved for their loose behavior.

“Men kill their wives and their mistresses all the time,” Malloy reminded her. “How many of them ever go to prison, much less hang, for it? That’s because their lawyers convince the jury the women were shrews or wantons or whatever, and the men on the jury start thinking how often they’ve wanted to commit murder in their own homes with far less provocation. If the woman was immoral, she deserved to die, so how can they convict this poor fellow? So they let him go.”

Sarah did groan aloud this time. He was right, of course. Far too many women had been falsely vilified in death so that their killers could escape punishment. “I don’t care what Anna Blake did, she didn’t deserve to die!” Sarah insisted. “And even if she did, Nelson wasn’t the one who killed her!”

“What did you offer this reporter to change his story?” Malloy said, his eyes fairly crackling with rage.

“What are you suggesting?” she countered, stung by his implication.

Malloy sighed in exasperation. “You must have promised him something. Reporters are like dogs. They never let go of a bone unless they see a bigger one.”

“I simply told him the truth, that Anna Blake had other lovers, so Nelson wasn’t necessarily the father of her child, and that she’d refused Nelson’s offer of marriage in favor of blackmail.”

“That’s all?” Plainly he didn’t believe it.

“That’s all,” she confirmed. “What other proof did I need that Anna Blake wasn’t an honest woman when she refused an offer of marriage to give her child a name?”

“There was no child,” Malloy said.

Sarah gaped at him. “What do you mean, no child?”

“Just that. Anna Blake wasn’t expecting a child. Do you have any coffee?” He headed off toward her kitchen without waiting for a reply.

She followed in his wake, looking at the story again, trying to find even a hint that Prescott had believed her that Nelson was innocent. She found none.

Malloy sat down at her kitchen table without being invited and waited for her to serve him. She lifted the pot and judged there was enough for one cup in it. It had been sitting for quite a while, but she figured Malloy wouldn’t care. She poured it into a cup and set it before him. “Do you want something to eat?”

He waved off her offer. “I’m on my way home.”

“How is Brian doing?” she asked, instantly picturing his sweet face.

Malloy shrugged. “He doesn’t like the cast, but it doesn’t seem to be hurting him much anymore.”

Sarah smiled. “He’ll be so excited when he finds out he can walk.”

Malloy nodded, apparently too superstitious to talk about it.

She decided to let the matter drop for now and sat down in front of him. “All right, what did you mean Anna Blake wasn’t with child?” she asked him again.

“The coroner said she wasn’t, and he looked pretty close. Besides, she was wearing a… a thing.” He got very interested in his coffee and wouldn’t meet her eye.

“What kind of thing?” she pressed.

He made a vague gesture with his hand, still not meeting her eye. “To keep her from…” He waved his hand again.

“From what?” she asked in exasperation.

“So she wouldn’t get with child in the first place,” he said impatiently.

Sarah let this information sink in. “What was she using? A sponge?” she asked in amazement.

Was Malloy blushing? “Yeah, that’s… that’s what the coroner said,” he mumbled, still looking intently at his coffee.

Sarah bit back a smile. For someone who spent his life investigating the worst aspect of the human condition, he was awfully prudish. “She lied to Nelson about the baby, then.”

“She lied to Giddings, too.”

“Was she blackmailing him as well?”

“A lot more successfully than she was Nelson, from the looks of it. He lost his job when he got caught stealing from the law firm where he worked.”

“Oh, dear. Do you know what this means? She probably would have tried to get Nelson to steal from the bank, too.”

“Why would he? He didn’t have a reputation or a family to protect.”

He had a good point. “It just doesn’t make any sense for her to have been trying to blackmail Nelson, does it?”

“A lot of this doesn’t make any sense. I need to talk to her landlady and that other woman who lives there. I’m sure they know more than they’re telling, and from what the old woman next door said, that other woman might be doing the same thing Anna was, only with different men.”

“How would a neighbor know that?” Sarah asked.

Malloy gave her a pitying look. “Doesn’t Mrs. Ellsworth know everything you do?”

“She doesn’t know everything I do. She knows you call on me, but if I was seducing you and trying to blackmail you, she couldn’t know that unless one of us told her,” she pointed out.

He gave her one of his looks. “All right, the old woman didn’t know about everything, but she did see several different men coming and going at the house, more than Anna could have accommodated by herself. They never stepped out with the women, either.”

“If they were married, they couldn’t risk being seen,” Sarah guessed.

“That’s what I thought.”

“And if several men were calling on each of the women, the landlords had to know about it,” Sarah said.

“Especially if they were entertaining the men in their rooms,” Malloy pointed out.

“I thought you were going to see Mrs. Walcott today to find out about this.”

“She wasn’t home. Nobody was home when I called there this morning, and then I got a case of my own to work on. This isn’t my case, remember, and I’ve got to at least pretend I’m doing my own work. Otherwise, they might get a little annoyed with me down at Mulberry Street.”

“If it would help, I could call on her tomorrow with you,” Sarah offered. “A Sunday afternoon call would be just the thing.”

“Just the thing for what?” he asked with another of his looks.

“Just the thing to get her talking about her tenants.”

“If she’s running what amounts to a bawdy house, she’s not likely to confide it in you,” he pointed out.

“She’s even less likely to confide it in you,” Sarah pointed out right back. “And have you searched Anna’s room yet? There might be a diary or some letters or something else. And the maid probably knows a lot, too. She just wouldn’t say anything in front of that other woman, Catherine Porter. I’m sure I could get Catherine to talk, too, if I just had the chance.”

“Are you going to ask them to line up and take their turns answering your questions?” Malloy asked sarcastically.

He was right, of course. She couldn’t just show up on their doorstep and question them, one by one. Only Malloy could do that. “At least let me search her room. You know I’m good at that!”

She could see he was remembering the first time they’d met, when she’d found a vital clue for him while searching a murder victim’s room.

“What excuse will you use for turning up on their doorstep?” he asked, downing the last of his coffee.

“I’ll be coming as your assistant,” she countered.

This drew the blackest look yet, but she merely smiled serenely.

“Mrs. Brandt,” he said sternly, “you do not work for the police department, and you are not my assistant. You have no right to be investigating a murder at all. Besides, they already know you’re a midwife.”

“You know perfectly well you could bring a trained monkey along with you to question people and no one would dare challenge you. The police do whatever they want. If you say I can search the entire house and ask people whatever I want, then I can. What time should I meet you there?”

Someone started pounding at her door, a frantic sound she knew only too well.

“Sounds like someone wants to see you,” Malloy observed.

“It’s a baby. They always knock like that when it’s a baby.”

“Go ahead, then. I’ll let myself out the back. I need to talk to Nelson Ellsworth again. There’s something about this whole thing that smells bad, and maybe he can help me understand it.”

“You aren’t leaving until you tell me what time you’ll be at the boardinghouse tomorrow,” she warned when he got up and started for the back door.

His grin told her she didn’t stand much chance of stopping him, even if he didn’t tell her anything, but he said, “I’ll probably be there around one o’clock, if you’re finished with your duties by then.”

Sarah smiled with satisfaction and went to answer the anxious summons.

Frank stood where Mrs. Ellsworth could see him through her back window in the fading sunlight. The door opened only a few seconds after he’d knocked, and Mrs. Ellsworth greeted him as if he were the Prodigal Son.

“Oh, Mr. Malloy, how good of you to come. I dropped a knife this afternoon, so I knew a gentleman would be calling. I hoped it was you, and not another of those awful reporters. Do you have any word? Have you found the killer yet?” she asked as he came into her kitchen. Now that he had a good look at her, he realized this ordeal was taking a toll. Her eyes were shadowed from lack of sleep, and her whole body seemed to have shrunken, as if she were drawing up into herself under the weight of this terrible burden.

“Not yet, I’m afraid,” he told her, wishing he had better news. “But I have a few questions that Nelson might be able to answer.”

“I’m sure he’ll be happy to,” she said. “He’s been so upset. He hardly eats, and I have to beg him to come out of his room.”

“Maybe he’d make an exception for me,” Frank suggested.

“I’ll be sure he does,” the old woman promised. “Please, come in and have a seat in the parlor. I’ll fetch him down.”

Mrs. Ellsworth’s parlor looked exactly as Frank would have imagined it. Immaculately clean and cluttered with figurines and ornaments and crocheted doilies, it had the look of a room kept for “good,” and rarely used. Over the mantle hung a portrait of a man Frank assumed must be the elder Mr. Ellsworth. The painting made him look dyspeptic.

Frank seated himself on the horsehair sofa to wait.

A few minutes later, he heard footsteps on the stairs. Mrs. Ellsworth came down first to tell him Nelson would be following, and he did in another moment, moving as if he were the older of the two. If Mrs. Ellsworth looked tired, Nelson looked positively ill. He hadn’t shaved in days, his hair had been carelessly combed, and his clothes were rumpled, like he’d been sleeping in them. His face was the worst, though. Haggard and pale, he stared at Frank with the hopelessness of a condemned man.

“If you’ll excuse us, Mrs. Ellsworth,” Frank said, rising to usher her out of the room. Plainly she didn’t want to leave.

“Can I get you anything? Are you hungry?” she asked anxiously, looking for an excuse to return.

“No, we won’t need anything,” Frank assured her, closing the parlor door practically in her face. He hoped she wouldn’t listen outside the door. She wouldn’t want to hear the answers to the questions Frank had to ask.

Nelson had seated himself in one of the chairs and was staring up at him with resignation. “You’re here to arrest me, aren’t you?” he said.

“Not yet,” Frank replied cheerfully. “We’re still working on the case, and some questions have come up that I’m hoping you can answer.”

“Questions about what?”

“About you and Anna Blake. When was the last time you were with her?”

“I saw her Monday evening, the night I went there with Mrs. Brandt. I stayed for a while after Mrs. Brandt left, but Anna was so upset, I finally left.”

“You didn’t see her the next night, the night she was killed?” Frank asked.

Nelson shook his head. “No, she told me not to come back, that she never wanted to see me again.”

“So you weren’t ever going to see her again?” Frank asked incredulously.

“Oh, no, she said that often, whenever she was upset. I would give her a day or two to calm down, then call on her again. She never seemed to remember that she’d told me not to come back, you see. This time I planned to give her several days, and then…”

His voice broke and he covered his eyes with his hand. Frank stared at him in pity, but he had no time for such indulgences. He needed Nelson to accept the truth about the dead woman. The sooner he did, the sooner he’d be a help in solving her murder.

“Nelson, this is very important. When was the last time you… uh… screwed Anna Blake?”

Nelson’s eyes widened in shock. Plainly, no one had ever asked him such a thing. “Really, Mr. Malloy, that’s hardly-” he began in outrage, but Frank didn’t have the patience for his finer feelings.

“You’ve already told me you did it. How else could she have convinced you that you’d gotten her in a family way? Now just tell me when was the last time?”

“I… I don’t really remember exactly,” he hedged. “I mean, there was just the one time and-”

“Just one time?” Frank echoed in surprise.

Nelson flushed. “What kind of am man do you think I am? I couldn’t take advantage of her like that!”

“You did it once, why not again?” Frank countered reasonably.

Nelson grew even redder, if that was possible. “The first time it was… Well, it was a mistake, a terrible mistake. I’ll never forgive myself, but I wasn’t myself at all, you see, and-”

“Who were you, if you weren’t yourself?” Frank asked a little sarcastically.

Nelson had a the grace to look chagrinned. “It was the wine,” he admitted reluctantly.

“What wine?”

“The wine that… Anna wasn’t feeling well, and…” He gestured helplessly.

“Why don’t you start at the beginning and tell me how it happened,” Frank suggested.

“It’s so ungentlemanly,” Nelson protested.

“Seducing her was ungentlemanly,” Frank countered. “Telling me how it happened might save your neck.”

Nelson winced, but he couldn’t argue with such logic. “I came to call on her, just the way I had been for several weeks. I was concerned about her, you see. She didn’t have a friend in the world, and I didn’t want her to end up on the street the way so many other girls do.”

“Of course not,” Frank said encouragingly. “And of course you had to give her money.”

“It was just a loan,” he insisted. “She was going to pay me back. She didn’t want to take charity.”

“That’s very commendable, “Frank said, the irony lost on Nelson.

“One evening I stopped by on my way home from the bank, just to say hello, you understand. But Mrs. Walcott told me Anna was ill. She seemed very upset. She thought Anna might be going into a decline. Having lost her mother and no longer being able to provide for herself, Mrs. Walcott thought Anna might simply die to avoid what she considered a worse fate.”

“Was she really sick?” Frank asked when he hesitated, lost in his memories.

“She seemed to be. Although it was highly improper, and Mrs. Walcott assured me she never allowed gentleman callers above stairs, she asked me to go to Anna’s room to see if I could help in some way. That’s how concerned she was.”

This was starting to make a lot of sense to Frank. Seducing a woman wasn’t as easy as people made it sound. Women were usually trussed up in so many layers of corsets and clothing that just getting to them was half-a-day’s work. Even rape required a lot of determination to dig through all those petticoats. But if Anna were ill, she’d be in her nightclothes, simplifying the process considerably.

“So you went to her room,” Frank prodded.

“Yes, she was very ill indeed. I wanted to call a doctor immediately, but she begged me not to. She said she felt much better just having me there and knowing I cared about her. Mrs. Walcott had sent up a bottle of wine, thinking that might make Anna feel better. She didn’t want to drink it. Her mother had been a temperance worker, you see, so I took some myself, just to encourage her. I don’t know how much I drank before I finally convinced her to try some, but it must have been too much. By the time I realized I wasn’t myself, it was too late.”

“Are you telling me you turned into a raging beast?” Frank asked skeptically.

“Certainly not!” Nelson cried, but his outrage evaporated instantly. “At least I didn’t realize I did. Later, Anna told me… Well, I started to feel a little unsteady, and Anna tried to help me to my feet so I could go back downstairs. The last thing I remember, my arms were around her and…”

“You don’t remember what happened?” Frank asked in amazement.

“If I’d been in my right mind, it never would have happened!” he insisted. “When I came to myself again, Anna was curled up on the bed beside me, weeping piteously. I knew what I’d done, even before she told me I’d ruined her.”

“What did you do then?”

“What do you think I did? I asked her to become my wife. I’m not a cad!”

“And what did she say?” Frank asked, not bothering to express his opinion on Nelson’s honor.

“She… Well, she was naturally upset. I don’t think she realized the implications. She just told me to go away and never see her again. She was terribly ashamed and wanted to forget this had ever happened. She made me swear I would never tell, and of course I never would have.”

“So you just left?”

“I didn’t have much choice. I couldn’t stay there with her, even if she’d wanted me to. Mrs. Walcott would have thought that strange indeed.”

“Indeed,” Frank murmured.

“I resolved to come back the next day and make my offer again, when Anna was more composed and had had time to realize her situation. But when I did return, she wouldn’t see me. She wouldn’t see me for several weeks, and then…”

“Then you got an urgent message,” Frank guessed.

“How did you know?”

“Just a lucky guess,” Frank said wearily. “Nelson, there was no baby.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, Anna Blake wasn’t with child.”

He frowned in confusion. “But she was so sure.”

“The coroner assures me she wasn’t, and what’s more, she knew it. She was actually taking precautions not to be.”

Now Nelson was really confused. “What kind of precautions?”

Frank didn’t feel as embarrassed as he had with Sarah Brandt, but he still didn’t have the proper words for this. “If a woman doesn’t want to have a child, she can put a sponge inside of her to protect her from it. She was wearing one when she died. And Nelson…?”

Nelson didn’t want to hear the rest of this. “Yes?” he asked with great reluctance.

“She’d been with another man not long before she died.”

Nelson closed his eyes as the full knowledge of his betrayal washed over him. “It wasn’t me,” he whispered.

“Then we’ve got to find out who it was.”