there was only one person he’d die to protect: Letitia Blackwell.
Frank figured he shouldn’t be surprised to realize he’d once again underestimated a female. Sarah Brandt was always accusing him of doing just that. But even she had been fooled this time. As difficult as it was to imagine, Letitia Blackwell had blown her husband’s brains out and then calmly kept an assignation with her lover.
Now all he had to do was convince the chief of detectives, the police commission, and Maurice Symington that sweet Letitia Blackwell should be charged with murder.
SARAH WAS READY to commit murder herself by the time she heard Malloy’s familiar footstep in the hall. Dudley had been sleeping soundly for quite a while now, and she was tired and stiff and hungry and very annoyed with having to tuck and retuck her torn skirt back into its waistband.
She threw open the door before Malloy even had a chance to knock and said, “Thank heaven you’re here! You’ve got to find someone else to look after Dudley for a while so I can… What on earth is wrong?”
He blinked in confusion. “I thought you were going to tell me,” he said.
“No, I mean what’s wrong with you? You look like someone died.”
“It’s worse than that. Is Dudley awake?”
She glanced over. He hadn’t batted an eye at Malloy’s arrival. “He’s in the arms of Morpheus.”
“Morphine-induced slumber,” she explained. “Come in and tell me what’s happened. Didn’t Potter confess?”
“Oh, he confessed all right,” Malloy said as he came in and allowed her to close the door behind him. “The problem is, he isn’t guilty.”
“I know he’s the one who tried to kill Dudley,” she insisted. “I found the key, remember?”
“Well, he’s guilty of that, and he most likely killed Calvin, damn his soul, but he didn’t kill Blackwell.”
“Why would he have killed the others if he didn’t kill Blackwell? Did he try to deny it?”
“Oh, no, he confessed to that, too, but he’s not the killer.” He explained to her about Potter’s failure to explain Blackwell’s murder accurately.
“Maybe he just forgot he did those things,” she tried.
“Would you forget if you’d gone to the trouble to make someone’s death look like a suicide and the police didn’t believe it?”
She supposed he was right. “Then who…?” She glanced at Dudley suspiciously. “Do you think…?”
“I think Letitia Blackwell did it,” he said.
She was surprised, but only for a moment. Then everything fell into place. “Dudley just told me this morning that she was terrified Blackwell would find out she was using the morphine and make her quit again. You can’t imagine how terrible an ordeal it is to wean yourself off of an opiate.”
Malloy nodded. “That gives me a better motive, then. I was having a hard time trying to figure out why she would’ve been driven to blow her husband’s brains out just because he was a bigamist.”
“I don’t think she even knew that,” Sarah said. “But Dudley also said she and Blackwell had a terrible argument the day he was killed. Blackwell accused her of using morphine again, but he hadn’t been able to find any in the house. She was very careful about that, but she knew when the baby came, she wouldn’t be able to get out for weeks. She couldn’t go without the drug, so she’d have to keep a supply in the house. Blackwell was sure to find it.”
Malloy nodded. “She was desperate, and the only way to protect herself was to kill Blackwell.”
Sarah shook her head. “I still can’t imagine Letitia doing something so… so messy.”
“I guess you haven’t seen the things morphine users do when they can’t get their drugs. It turns them into animals. Besides, for who else would Potter confess to protect? He must know, or at least strongly suspect, that she was the killer. That’s why he killed Calvin, too, to protect her again.”
“And why he tried to kill Dudley, so Letitia wouldn’t marry a man he considered unworthy of her.”
“I think he just didn’t want her to marry any man who wasn’t him,” Malloy said. “He’d somehow convinced himself that she’d turn to him if Blackwell wasn’t around anymore.”
“Maybe he even intended to tell her he’d killed Calvin to protect her,” Sarah speculated. “He might have imagined she’d be so grateful to him that she’d fall into his arms. Of course, he didn’t know about Dudley’s prior claim.”
Malloy sighed wearily. He looked as if he’d gotten as little sleep last night as she had, and that was probably true. He’d been questioning Potter for most of it. “So I guess now I have to go see Letitia Blackwell.”
“What are you going to do?” Sarah asked in alarm. “You aren’t going to try to arrest her, are you?”
“I’ve been trying to figure that out all the way over here this morning. I was hoping you’d have an idea.”
He looked so forlorn Sarah had an irrational urge to hug him. Fortunately, she resisted it. Poor Malloy would have probably fainted from shock at such an inappropriate gesture.
“Oh, dear,” she said, automatically tucking in her skirt as she moved to the chair and sat down. “Give me a minute to think. Obviously, you can’t arrest her. Symington would have your head. And no jury would ever convict her. The men in the jury box would probably all confess to the crime themselves just to keep her from going to jail.”
“So do we let her get away with killing her husband?” Malloy asked, frustration thick in his voice.
“Heaven forbid! I just can’t think… What would be a punishment for her if she can’t go to prison?”
“Being ruined socially?” Malloy suggested.
She looked at him in surprise. “What made you think of that?”
“Potter. He said that’s why he killed Calvin, to protect Letitia’s reputation in society. He was afraid the bigamy scandal would ruin her. Would she really care if no one ever accepted her again?”
“I’m sure she’d be crushed, but she’d have her morphine to comfort her. She might not even remember she was being shunned.”
“What else would be a punishment, then? Taking her morphine away?”
“Her father probably wouldn’t allow it. If he thought she was suffering, he’d give her whatever she wanted. No, there must be something else. Maybe…”
“Maybe what?”
Sarah considered. “It’s a risk, but if we can convince her father that she really killed Blackwell, he might take some sort of action to make sure she never harmed anyone else. There is her child to think of, you know.”
“You mean he might keep her locked away or something?” Malloy asked.
“I have no idea, but he’s the only hope we have. He’s arrogant and unreasonable, but if he was convinced Letitia had killed her husband, he’d do something about it. He wouldn’t want to risk her doing anything else so shocking. He must already be annoyed with her about Dudley and the baby. This could force his hand.”
“He’d probably at least keep the lovers apart.”
“Yes, and we could even suggest that. I’d hate to think of them living happily ever after with two men dead because of them.”
“It isn’t much punishment for murder,” Malloy said.
“At least people will know she did it. Some killers never even get that much punishment,” Sarah said.
“I guess I need to set up a meeting with Letitia and Symington, then.”
“You’ll need me there,” she said.
“Why?” he asked with a frown of disapproval.
Sarah gave him a pitying look while her mind raced for a credible reason. Fortunately, she didn’t have to think very long to find one. “What if Letitia decides to faint or even refuses to see you? Are you going to go barging into her bedroom and confront her? Besides, I’m a woman. I can probably keep one step ahead of her reasoning process. That’s something you’ll never be able to do.”
Apparently, this was the right answer. “Can you leave Dudley alone for a while?”
“No, we’ll have to find someone to watch him while I’m gone. And you’ve got to give me some time to go home and change. I can’t go to the Blackwell house with my skirt half falling off.”
“You need to do something to your hair, too,” he said, making Sarah blink in surprise. Since when did Malloy notice her hair? “I’ll go try to scare up Dr. Woomer. Won’t hurt him to sit with Dudley a couple hours.”
When he’d gone, Sarah realized with amazement that Malloy was willingly taking her with him to settle a
