“I do not know,” Serafina said in dismay. “I did not pay attention, but it does not matter, because then she changed her mind.”
“What do you mean?” Sarah asked.
“She saw they could make a lot of money from the seances. She said… she said it was easier and not as dangerous. She said no one would get killed,” she remembered suddenly.
“That’s what she said?” Malloy asked. “That nobody would get killed?”
“Yes, this other thing, what the Professor wanted to do, that was dangerous, but the seances were not. She said they attracted a better class of people.” Serafina glanced at Mrs. Decker apologetically.
“And did the Professor agree with her?” Sarah asked.
“No, no,” Serafina said. “He was not happy. They would argue about it at night sometimes, after Nicola and I went to bed.”
“Why didn’t he just take the money himself?” Malloy asked.
“They did not have enough yet. I think…”
“What do you think, dear?” Mrs. Decker asked when Serafina hesitated.
“I think they would never give me my part of the money,” she said bitterly. “I think they would have taken it all and left us with nothing.”
Sarah thought that, too.
“So the Professor stayed because he didn’t have enough money yet to do whatever it was he wanted to do with it,” Malloy said, drawing Serafina’s attention back. “But Mrs. Gittings had changed her mind and just wanted to keep doing the seances.”
“Yes, she asked did he not like living in a nice house and not worrying about the police. She said he was stupid to think about anything else. But he said they could live in a mansion and never have to work again.”
Malloy sat back and considered what she had told him.
“Do you know what it was he wanted to do?” Sarah asked him.
“I have a good idea,” he replied.
“What do you think it was?”
“They call it the Green Goods Game.”
“What is it?” Sarah asked.
“It’s a way to trick people out of their money. They send out letters all over the country, offering to sell people counterfeit money.”
“Is that legal?” Mrs. Decker asked in amazement.
Malloy’s mouth quirked, but he managed not to smile. “Not at all. But lots of people are curious enough to travel to New York to find out more about it. The operators pay all their travel expenses, too, even if they decide not to buy in. So the suckers come to New York and somebody-the one they call the steerer-meets them at the train and takes them to a hotel. Then the steerer takes them to meet the one they call the Old Gentleman, who is someone who looks very respectable. The Old Gentleman shows them a suitcase full of what they think is the counterfeit money, except it’s real money.”
“Real money? Why would they show them real money?” Sarah asked.
“To convince them it’s good quality so they’ll buy it.”
“How much does counterfeit money cost?” Mrs. Decker asked with interest.
“Ten cents on the dollar. When the sucker is convinced, he pays for the money, and the operators lock it into a suitcase for him. Then the steerer escorts him right back to the train that will take him back home and puts him on it.”
“I do not understand,” Serafina said. “How does this make any money if they sell real money for less than it is worth?”
“Because when the sucker is distracted, the operators switch suitcases. When the sucker gets home and opens it, it’s full of sawdust or blank pieces of paper or bricks or something.”
“But don’t they go back to New York and complain that they were swindled?” Mrs. Decker asked, outraged.
This time Malloy couldn’t help smiling. “What would they say? That they were trying to buy counterfeit money and someone cheated them?”
The women all exclaimed their surprise.
“How clever!” Sarah said. “And you think this is what the Professor wanted to use the money for?”
“Yes, but they’d need at least ten thousand dollars in cash to show the suckers. The operators usually have somebody who gives them the money to show the suckers and takes about half the profits. The steerer and the Old Gentleman and their other helpers each get a share of the other half.”
“How much could someone earn doing this?” Sarah asked.
“At least a couple thousand dollars.”
“A year?” Mrs. Decker asked.
“No,” Malloy told her. “A
The women gasped. A couple thousand dollars was a good annual wage for a working man.
“No wonder the Professor was trying to convince Mrs. Gittings to do it,” Sarah said.
“But Mrs. Gittings was afraid it was too dangerous,” Serafina reminded them.
“It is,” Malloy said. “Sometimes the suckers get suspicious, or they figure out what’s going on, and they pull a gun or the operators do. Sometimes people get shot.”
“So that explains what the Professor wanted the money for,” Sarah said.
“If I’m right about it, it does,” Malloy allowed. “But none of that matters now. What matters is if it gave him a reason to kill her, and I don’t think it did, at least not until they had enough to bankroll him for a Green Goods Game.”
“But they fight all the time,” Serafina insisted.
“Lots of people fight but never kill each other,” he told her. “Beside, they didn’t have enough money to set up his own game yet. When they did, he might have killed her if she refused to go along with him on their original plan. But that hadn’t happened, and he still needed her to keep running the seances.”
“Did he?” Sarah asked.
Malloy frowned. “Did he what?”
“Did he need her to run the seances?” She turned to Serafina. “Could you do the seances without her?”
“I don’t… Yes, we could,” she decided. “At first she got clients for me, but after a while, people began to bring their friends and… No, we did not need her anymore.”
“So the Professor could have killed her to make sure that she wasn’t around to mess up his plans,” Malloy said.
“Except,” Sarah reminded him with a superior grin, “he wasn’t even in the room when she was killed.”
11
THAT EVENING, LONG AFTER M ALLOY AND SAR AH’S mother had left and when Catherine had finally gone reluctantly to bed, Sarah and Serafina had to tell Maeve and Mrs. Ellsworth everything they had discussed earlier in the day. Serafina had chosen not to return to the house on Waverly Place that afternoon as the Professor had asked. Even though she had scheduled clients who might have appeared, she simply couldn’t stand the thought of going back into the room where Mrs. Gittings had died.
Mrs. Ellsworth asked dozens of questions during Sarah’s narrative as the four of them sat around Sarah’s kitchen table, but Maeve just listened quietly, her expression unreadable. She was especially attentive when Sarah was describing the Green Goods Game.
When Mrs. Ellsworth finally ran out of questions, Maeve spoke up at last. “What does this Professor look like?”
They all looked at her in surprise.
“He’s tall and very dignified,” Sarah said. “Like a butler in a fine house. Dark hair with some gray at the temples.”
