Murder On Astor Place

Malloy frowned. “She might tell him. He might already be bribing her for her silence, so she’d feel a sense of loyalty or at least obligation to tell him. Or maybe she doesn’t even know Alicia was killed that night she visited her. Then you both would be in danger.”

“I’m not afraid. I’ll go see her in the daylight.”

“Do you think people don’t get killed in the daylight?” he asked, obviously horrified at her hopeless naivete.

“I think I’ll be safe from a crippled old woman,” she said, amused by his dismay. Could Malloy really be concerned for her safety?

Before he could reply, another visitor knocked on Sarah’s door.

“Who’s that?” Malloy asked, on his feet in an instant.

“I guess I won’t know until I open the door,” Sarah allowed.

“It’s kind of late for visitors.” He was frowning like a disapproving father.

Sarah decided not to point out that he was there, and surely, he also counted as a visitor since he didn’t live there. “I’m a midwife, Malloy. I get visitors at all hours of the day and night. This is actually early compared to some.”

He followed her into the front room, maintaining a discreet distance so he would be out of sight of whoever was at the door but still close enough to hear what was said. Trying to be amused rather than annoyed by his presumption, Sarah asked who was there.

“It’s Will Yardley, Mrs. Brandt.”

Sarah threw the door open. “Is it the baby? Is she sick again?”

Will looked surprised and very young in the shadows. “Oh, no, she’s doing just fine. That tea you told Dolly to make did the trick. It’s that other thing. I got the information you wanted.” He glanced over his shoulder, as if checking to be sure no one was following him, and Sarah decided this was simply a habit.

“Come in and tell me what you learned,” she said, stepping back so he could enter. She closed the door behind him so he would feel safer.

When he judged it was secure and they could not be overheard, he said, “The fellow you was looking for, Fisher?”

“Yes, did you find him?” she asked eagerly.

“Not him exactly, but a friend of mine what knows him, he seen him down in the Bowery.”

“The Bowery?” Sarah echoed in surprise. She would have expected Sylvester Mattingly’s employee to have a better address than the city’s lowest slum.

“Yeah, he’s been living in a flophouse down there. Place they call the Brass Lantern.”

A flophouse? This was the lowest of accommodations, only one step above sleeping on the street. For a nickel, a man could “flop” on the floor, for a few cents more he could have a hammock, and if he really wanted luxury, a dime would buy a cot for the night. Men slept shoulder to shoulder in the most appalling conditions, and only the lowest of the low could be found there. This made no sense at all. What would Ham Fisher, a man who fancied himself a private detective, be doing in a place like that?

“Are you sure it’s him?” Malloy demanded, stepping out of the shadows.

Will started and swore an oath. “What’s a copper doin’ here, Mrs. Brandt? You didn’t tell me about no coppers bein’ mixed up in this.”

He would have bolted, but Sarah grabbed his sleeve and held on tight. “Mr. Malloy is a friend of mine, Will. He’s just visiting.”

“The hell you say. You telling me he ain’t no copper?”

Sarah wondered how he could tell Malloy’s occupation simply by looking at him, but she supposed that was a skill Will would have developed early in life. “He’s trying to solve a murder.”

“This Fisher killed somebody?” Will asked, even more alarmed.

“No, but he might know who did. It was a young girl, Will, only sixteen. Not much younger than Dolly.”

“This ain’t none of my business. I gotta go.”

“Maybe you’d like to answer Mrs. Brandt’s questions down at Police Headquarters,” Malloy said in a voice she’d never heard before. It frightened even her.

The color drained from Will’s face, and she had to hold him with both hands.

“Stop it!” she ordered Malloy. “You’re frightening him!”

“That’s the best way to deal with the likes of him,” Malloy insisted.

“Not in my house,” Sarah insisted right back. “Will, he isn’t taking you anywhere, not after you came here and did me a favor. I want to thank you for that. This Brass Lantern, where is it located?”

“I know where it is,” Malloy said. “You can let him go, if that’s all he knows.”

She glared at Malloy, although it didn’t seem to faze him, then turned to Will with a smile. “Thank you for coming, Will. And tell Dolly I’ll check on her and the baby in a day or two.”

“You didn’t tell me about no coppers,” he repeated plaintively, giving Malloy one last desperate look before bolting for the door.

When he was gone, Sarah turned to Malloy in disgust. “Is that how you treat all your informants? It’s a wonder you ever solve any crimes at all!”

“I lack your charm, Mrs. Brandt. I have to use the tools I’ve got.”

“Well, remind me never to commit a murder in New York. I would hate to see your ‘tools’ firsthand.”

Sarah brushed past him and returned to the kitchen where she refilled her cup. When she saw he had followed her back, she filled his, too. He took that as an invitation to sit again, which he did. Sarah wanted to be angry with him, but she had to admit, she wasn’t. Not really. He was only doing his job, or what would have been his job if someone hadn’t taken him off the case. Since she was trying to do the same thing, she shouldn’t fault him for using different methods than she would have chosen.

“Now, tell me where this Brass Lantern is so I can find Ham Fisher,” she said, taking the seat opposite him.

He smiled again, that odd little grin that looked as if he seldom used it. Obviously, she had startled it out of him. “You’re not going to the Brass Lantern.”

“Then who will?”

“I’ll go. Nobody will question what I’m doing there,” he added when she would have protested. “I can always say I’m working on another case. I find a lot of suspects at places like the Brass Lantern.”

“I can imagine.”

He sipped his coffee, watching her over the rim of his cup with what looked like admiration, but perhaps she was mistaken. Maybe he was just laughing at her again.

“Then I’ll find Mrs. Petrovka and see if she’ll tell me who took her to see Alicia that night, and you’ll go to the Brass Lantern to talk to Fisher. One of us is bound to find out who the killer is, and then what will we do?”

Malloy took another sip of his coffee. “Then we go see Roosevelt.”

SARAH HAD NO trouble finding Emma Petrovka’s address. The woman advertised openly in the newspapers, even though her profession was patently illegal. No one ever prosecuted abortionists. There was too much real crime in the city for the police to have time to bother with such trifles, especially when no one was likely to pay a reward for apprehending them. Unless Petrovka killed too many patients, and even then no one would care unless one of them was someone of importance.

Sarah was going over a speech in her head when she left her house that morning, trying to figure out what to say that would sound like a plausible reason for having sought out an abortionist. Mrs. Elsworth’s cheery greeting interrupted her thoughts. The woman was sweeping her immaculate porch. If she came out to sweep every time someone she wanted to talk to walked down the street-and Sarah was fairly certain she did-it must get swept a dozen times a day.

“Looks like it’s going to be another warm one, today, Mrs. Brandt. Off to deliver a baby this morning, are you?” she asked.

“No, I’ve got an appointment,” Sarah said. It wasn’t quite a lie. She had an appointment even if Mrs. Petrovka didn’t.

“Be careful then. I baked some bread this morning, and the top of the loaf split. I’ve been worried sick ever since. You know what that means, don’t you? There’s going to be a funeral soon.”