Frank figured Brigit missed the irony. Well, at least he’d established Keith’s alibi for the entire night. Too bad. He would’ve liked to see a man like that sit down in Old Sparky, New York’s new electric chair. He’d just have to hope there was a special place in hell for people like Dickie Keith.
Frank was just about to tell Brigit to get herself cleaned up and off to her job when they heard a scream. Frank ducked out onto the landing, looking up and down to see if he could tell from what direction it had come.
“Murder!” someone was screaming from above. “Help, somebody! It’s murder!”
11
Frank set off up the stairs, taking them two at a time. By the time he reached the top floor, people had started emerging from their flats, eyes wide with curiosity and fear. A middle-aged woman stood in front of a half-opened door wailing in terror. Then he saw which door it was, and he groaned.
Frank showed his badge, and the woman pointed. “All that blood! She’s dead, ain’t she?”
He pushed the door open all the way and peered in. The first thing he saw was the sprays of blood all over the wall.
The metallic smell filled his nostrils. Mrs. O’Hara sat in the same chair she’d occupied when he’d called on her a few days ago. The ties she’d been sewing were still spread on the table, only now the woman was slumped over them. Her dark blood had stained them, pooled on the tabletop, and spilled onto the floor.
He stepped back and pulled the door closed behind him.
When he turned, he saw a sea of horrified faces staring at him, waiting for him to make sense of it. Brigit had followed him up the stairs. She stood on the landing, her tear-blotched face now a ghostly white.
“Somebody go find a beat cop,” he said, using the tone that demanded obedience. No one moved, so Frank pointed at a young man. “You!” he said sharply. The fellow turned tail and fairly flew down the steps.
“Ain’t you gonna help her?” the woman who had been screaming demanded desperately.
“No one can help her now. Are you the one who found her?”
The woman’s eyes were unfocused. She was probably in shock. “We go to the market every Friday, but she didn’t come down, so I come up to get her,” she said in wonder.
“When she didn’t answer, I opened the door . . .” She swayed, and one of the other women caught her before she fell. Several others hurried to get her into a neighboring flat.
“Why’d anybody want to kill Mrs. O’Hara?” Brigit asked Frank.
Frank could think of a lot of reasons, and those reasons pointed to several people in particular. He was beginning to think things might finally be falling into place.
The medical examiner had been looking around the room and at the body for much longer than Frank’s patience would permit.
“How long does it take to figure out somebody cut her throat?” he asked with annoyance.
Dr. Haynes gave him a jaundiced look. “Not long, since they told me that before I even left my office,” he said, matching Frank’s tone. “I thought you’d like to know how it happened, too, or am I wasting my time?”
“All right, you win. How did it happen?” Frank asked wearily.
“Looks like she was sitting here at the table, working on these . . . ties, are they?”
“Yeah, that’s right.”
“Somebody came up behind her. Probably, he grabbed her by the hair. See how it’s all sticking up on top there, like somebody pulled it?”
Frank nodded.
“He pulled her head back.” The doc pretended to be grabbing himself by the hair on his head with his left hand and pulling it back. “Then he sliced her throat from behind.” He made as if he were holding a knife and drawing it across his throat from left to right.
“Doesn’t look like she put up much of a fight,” Frank observed.
“He probably snuck up behind her and took her by surprise. Maybe the door was open, and he just walked in. Or maybe it was somebody she knew who’d come to call, and she never expected him to grab her from behind and cut her throat.”
“Not many people expect that.”
“It’s a messy way to kill someone,” the doc added, pointing at the blood sprayed on the wall in front of where Mrs.
O’Hara had been sitting.
“So he would’ve had blood all over him?” Frank asked.
“Not likely, doing it from behind like that. The blood would shoot out in front. He’d get some on his hand and maybe his sleeve, but that’s about all. When he let her go, she was still alive for a minute or two. She’d be sitting up, bleeding on everything, and then she slumped down on the table when she died. Killer would’ve been long gone by the time the blood started dripping onto the floor, so he didn’t step in it, either.”
“Any idea when she was killed?”
“Not today,” doc said. “She’s in full rigor mortis, so anywhere from twelve to twenty-four hours ago.”
“That would make it sometime between mid-morning yesterday to late last night.”
“You might find somebody who saw her yesterday to help narrow down the time, although it won’t help much if nobody saw the actual killer.”
Frank didn’t want to think about that possibility. “Why do you think there’s blood on that towel?” Frank asked, pointing at a piece of rag lying on the floor near the body.
“Did the killer wipe his hands?”
The Doc picked it up and looked at it. “No, the smear is too neat. I didn’t find the murder weapon. Looks like the killer used this to wipe the knife off and took it with him.”
He glanced around the shabby room. “Why’d somebody want to kill her? There’s nothing here worth stealing, and what could she do to make somebody that mad at her?”
“Did you see the stories about the Italians who suppos-edly kidnapped an Irish girl and killed her to get her baby?”
“Yes, the Ruoccos were supposed to have done it, but I don’t believe it for a minute. I’ve eaten at their place for years, and I know every one of them.”
“This woman was the Irish girl’s mother.”
“The one who wanted to get the baby back?”
Frank nodded. Doc Haynes snorted in disgust. “She took on the Black Hand and Tammany Hall. She’s lucky they just cut her throat.”
“Detective Sergeant?” a voice called from the doorway.
Frank looked up to see Gino Donatelli. “What is it?”
“We’ve been questioning all the neighbors,” he reported.
“Some people outside remember a woman asking where Mrs. O’Hara lived yesterday.”
“A woman?” Frank echoed in surprise, instantly thinking of what Ugo Ruocco had said about Patrizia. Putting a pillow over someone’s face was one thing, but slitting someone’s throat . . .
“Yes, sir, a woman. Mrs. Murdock here, she was the one who sent her up to this flat.”
Frank hurried to the door, and he saw a woman standing on the landing, a baby on her hip. She was the one who had directed him to Brigit’s flat earlier. The child looked at him gravely, his thumb stuck securely in his mouth. “Do you remember what time it was you talked to this woman?” he asked.
Mrs. Murdock shrugged. “I didn’t think about it at the time. We hadn’t had dinner yet, so it was morning. Not real early, though.”
“Did you see her leave?”
“No, didn’t see her anymore after that at all.”
“Can you tell me what she looked like?” Frank asked, reaching into his coat pocket for a pad and pencil to jot down some notes.
“She doesn’t have to describe her,” Donatelli said grimly.
“She recognized the woman.”
“You know her?” Frank asked, unable to believe his luck.
Mrs. Murdock nodded.
“You’re positive?” Frank prodded.
