spilled in the carriage.”
“I wasn’t here when Mrs. Van Orner got home. I can ask Herman, but . . . Well, it wouldn’t have been unusual for her to empty an entire flask at one time.”
This was all beginning to make sense now. Herman must have known about Mrs. Van Orner’s tippling. That was why he claimed no knowledge of the flask when Frank asked him about it. “Will he tell you the truth?”
“Of course he will. But I can’t see that it matters. Drinking from her flask wouldn’t have harmed her. She did it all the time.”
“Maybe she got a bad batch or something. Can you show me where she kept her supply?”
“Of course not. She kept it in her bedroom.”
Frank had searched a lot of ladies’ bedrooms, but he figured he wasn’t going to get to search this one. “Can you bring me the bottles that are left? Especially any that are open?”
Miss Yingling stepped into the hall and gave the maid some instructions. When she returned, Frank was trying to think of anything else he might need before he left the house. He knew his chances of getting back in were very small. “Can you think of anybody in the house who might wish Mrs. Van Orner harm?”
“Which house?”
Frank remembered the rescue house where she’d been just before she died. “Either one.”
Miss Yingling pressed her lips together and lowered her gaze, just the way any well-bred young lady would if she was asked to blacken the character of another person. “I really hate to gossip.”
“If somebody killed your mistress, you want them to be punished, don’t you?”
She looked up, startled at his bluntness. “Well, of course!”
“Then tell me what you know. Is there anybody in this house who might’ve wanted Mrs. Van Orner dead?”
She flinched but she said, “I don’t believe so. Mrs. Van Orner always treated her staff kindly.”
“What about her family?”
“Mrs. Van Orner has no living family.”
“Not even any children?”
“She was never able to have children.”
“What about her husband?”
Miss Yingling took offense at that. “Mr. Van Orner was devoted to her.”
Frank hadn’t gotten that impression at all, but Van Orner wasn’t likely to give Frank permission to investigate if he’d killed his wife himself. “All right, what about the rescue house? Anybody there have it in for her?”
“Everyone there admired Mrs. Van Orner. The work she did—”
“Not everybody admired her,” he reminded her.
Plainly, she really didn’t like speaking ill of other people. “I guess you mean this Amy person, the one who met with Mrs. Van Orner today.”
“You said you didn’t know what they talked about, but you must have some idea.”
After a brief internal struggle, Miss Yingling decided to help him. “I told you, Amy refuses to do anything to help herself. She’s convinced the father of her baby is going to help her. She even named her baby after the man. She named him Gregory.”
Frank needed a minute to remember. “That’s Mr. Van Orner’s name. Did she claim he was the baby’s father?”
“Not exactly. She hasn’t named the father, at least not right out, but I don’t know what she might have said to Mrs. Van Orner today. If Amy had made such a claim, Mrs. Van Orner would certainly have been upset. Oh!” she exclaimed suddenly. “I just realized, that might explain why she left without me today. She wouldn’t have wanted anyone to see how upset she was.”
“And she would’ve needed a nip or two from her flask.”
A knock distracted them. Miss Yingling opened the door to the maid, who carried in a small wooden crate and set it down on one of the chairs. Miss Yingling dismissed her.
Frank lifted the lid of the crate to find half-a-dozen decoratively shaped, emerald green bottles packed carefully in straw. They might have held fancy perfume, but when Frank picked one up to examine the label, he saw they were, as Miss Yingling had said, some kind of liqueur called creme de menthe. Five of them were still sealed, but the sixth was more than half empty.
“I’ll need to take these with me to have them tested.”
“Do you think . . . Could there be something in it that killed her?”
“Only if somebody put it in there.”
“Oh!” She lifted her fingers to her lips again.
“Is it all right if I take them? And the flask, too?”
“Of course,” Miss Yingling said, taking a step back, as if afraid of contamination. “I’m sure no one else will be interested in them now.”
Frank slipped the flask into his pocket and picked up the crate. “Thank you for your help, Miss Yingling.”
“I almost forgot, Mr. Van Orner told me to take care of your fee.”
Frank tried not to let his annoyance show. “We can talk about that later.”
She let the maid show him out.
SARAH HAD INTENDED TO VISIT HER MOTHER THE NEXT day, to find out what she knew about the Van Orners, but her mother arrived on her doorstep that morning, before Sarah had even finished her breakfast. She’d brought a bakery box of petit fours, which were just the right size for a doll tea party. Mrs. Decker had helped Catherine eat them as they sat around the small table and drank water from the tiny china cups Mrs. Decker had brought on one of her many previous visits.
When the petit fours were gone and Catherine had tired of the tea party and moved off to play with something else, Mrs. Decker came back downstairs to drink coffee with her daughter. After some polite inquiries after her father’s health and her mother’s activities, Sarah finally asked the question she’d been longing to ask.
“Do you know Vivian Van Orner?”
“Gregory Van Orner’s wife? Of course I do. Why?”
“She died yesterday.”
“Good heavens! I hadn’t heard a thing about it.”
“It happened late yesterday afternoon. I don’t suppose they’ve had much time to tell people.”
“What happened to her?”
“They aren’t sure yet. She was alone in her carriage, and when they got to her house, the driver opened the door to let her out and she was dead.”
“She was so young.” Mrs. Decker shook her head in dismay. She was still an attractive woman, although her blond hair was threaded with silver, and fine lines had begun to form around her eyes. “Oh, dear!”
“What?” Sarah asked.
“Was she murdered? Oh, my, of course she was. That’s why you’re interested in her.”
Sarah had to admit it was a logical conclusion, considering how many murders she’d helped Frank Malloy investigate. “I told you, they aren’t sure yet.”
“But if you’re involved . . . You
“Not exactly.”
“Mr. Malloy told her she better not be either,” Maeve offered as she came into the kitchen. She’d brought the dirty plates and cups from upstairs to be washed.
Mrs. Decker’s face lit with interest when she looked at Sarah again. “You must tell me everything.”
“It started when Mrs. Brandt delivered a baby in a brothel,” Maeve said, carefully setting the fragile dishes down in the sink.
Mrs. Decker pretended to be scandalized. “A brothel! Sarah, how could you!”
Sarah glared at Maeve, who ignored her and started to tell Mrs. Decker the story, forcing Sarah to interrupt and tell her own version. After a few confusing minutes, Mrs. Decker had a condensed version of everything that had happened.
“How did she die?” Mrs. Decker asked when they were finished.
