“My stepmother. My father married her after my mother died, so he’d have somebody to take care of me, but then he died, too.”
Although he’d never given it much thought before, Frank realized he hated the fact that women like Mrs. Richmond and Garnet and Norah English were at the mercy of men like Chilton Devries. A decent woman left penniless and alone had few options in life, and those that didn’t require the kindness of some man were immoral or illegal. He’d once looked down on women who worked for their living, like Sarah Brandt, but now he understood how difficult and amazing it was for a woman to make her own way in the world. No wonder Garnet Devries had been interested in how Sarah had accomplished it.
“Do you think your uncle would take you back?”
“Not now. I’m a fallen woman.”
Frank doubted the uncle would see that as hypocritical. “I’ll bet if you write him a letter telling him Devries is dead and he’s got to take you in again, he’ll find you another protector, at least.”
“Oh, my, I never thought of that! You’re very clever.”
Frank didn’t feel clever. He felt ashamed of all the men who had abused this poor girl and who would continue to. She’d said they didn’t have any money, and she would need some to tide her over. He glanced around, trying to spot anything of value that she could sell, and something shiny on one of the tables caught his eye. A fancy silver bowl with a handle, half full of walnuts. The nutcracker and other implements lay nestled in the nuts. Chilton Devries had been fond of walnuts, he remembered.
“If that’s real silver, you could pawn it.”
Miss English stared at him in shock. “I couldn’t do that! Mr. Devries would never…Oh!”
“Right. He won’t know. And nobody else will know what was here, either. You should probably gather up everything you could pawn and sell it right away. You don’t know how much longer you’ll be here, and if somebody evicts you, it’ll be too late.”
“What’re you telling the girl?” Lizzie asked from the doorway.
“He said we should sell the nut bowl, and there’s another one upstairs. He said we should do it right away, before they put us out. Oh, and Mr. Devries’s shaving set. That’s silver, too.”
“Hush,” Lizzie said, frowning at Frank.
“Don’t worry, I don’t care what you do.”
“Here,” she said, thrusting a bulging pillowcase at him. “That’s all his clothes. You can be on your way now.”
Frank wanted to look through the clothes, but he could wait. He took his leave, and as Lizzie was closing the door behind him, he heard Miss English say, “He said we should ask Uncle Ned to find me another protector.”
Frank shook his head.
FRANK STOPPED OFF AT POLICE HEADQUARTERS AND WENT through the bag of clothing. He found the nightshirt and several changes of linen, but nothing had a hole in it. If Norah English had stabbed Devries, she’d done it while he was naked. The trouble was, he didn’t think she had. She was just too simple to lie well, and a girl too honest to hock someone else’s silver would never be able to hide a murder.
He’d put it off as long as he could. He needed to report what he’d learned to Felix Decker. As much as he would have enjoyed chatting with Mrs. Decker, he figured he shouldn’t risk the old man’s wrath by going to his house again.
He reached the office by midafternoon, half frozen and cursing the wintry wind that whipped mercilessly down the city’s streets. Decker’s secretary—an old-fashioned, middle-aged gentleman; no girl secretaries for Felix Decker—recognized him and only kept him waiting a few minutes before ushering him into the inner office.
Decker didn’t rise, but Frank noticed he’d put aside the papers he’d been working on to give Frank his full attention.
“Mr. Malloy, I’d given you up.”
“I had to go see Miss English, too.”
“The mistress? Was that Italian supposed to kill her, too?”
“Not that I know of, but I figured if I found a nightshirt with a bloody hole in it at her house, we could all rest a little easier.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“And what about this Mrs. Richmond? Is she still alive?”
“Oh, yes. She’s also Garnet Devries’s mother.”
“Good God!”
“I thought you must know that.”
“No, not …” Decker shifted uneasily.
“But you knew the name Richmond when I said it yesterday.”
Frank watched Decker’s inner struggle. Normally, Decker probably wouldn’t share much information with anyone, not even his closest friends. An intensely private man, he had also assigned Frank a difficult task, and withholding information would only hinder him in accomplishing that task. “I knew a man named Richmond.”
“Devries cheated him in a business deal.”
“No, he didn’t. At least he didn’t actually cheat him. He merely offered him the opportunity to invest. He gave me the same opportunity.”
“And did you take it?”
“Yes, but I wasn’t impressed with the possibilities, so I only put in fifty thousand.”
Frank didn’t think he’d ever heard the word
“Along with everyone else who invested. The difference was that I could afford to lose. Richmond couldn’t.”
“Then why did he do it?”
“Why does anyone do something stupid? He wanted to make money, I suppose, but more likely, he wanted to be seen as an equal to men like Devries.”
“And you.”
Decker shrugged. “Richmond came to the club when he heard the deal had gone sour. He made an ugly scene and had to be escorted out. I saw his obituary two days later.”
“He killed himself, leaving his wife and daughter with nothing.”
Decker considered this information. “What does this have to do with Chilton’s death?”
“I don’t know yet. I’m still trying to figure out why he wanted Mrs. Richmond dead.”
“Then you think the Italian was telling the truth?”
“Mrs. Richmond said he came to see her. He told her Devries had hired him to have her killed.”
“He must be a charming man.”
“She was pretty scared, but Angotti just wanted to know
“A compassionate gangster.”
“Thank God for that. The important thing is why did Devries want her dead in the first place? I think it has something to do with her daughter.”
“Garnet? What makes you think that?”
“Because that was her only connection to Devries. And the more I think about it, the more I think Devries ruined Richmond on purpose.”
“That’s ridiculous! Do you think he talked his friends into investing in a scheme he knew would fail?”
“Why not? You said yourself you didn’t have much confidence in the scheme. And none of his other friends got ruined. They’re like you. They can afford to take a risk and lose now and then, but not Richmond. And why go to Richmond in the first place? The man wasn’t rich. He couldn’t even get into your club.”
Decker tapped a finger on his desk for several moments. “I did wonder about that afterwards, but perhaps Chilton didn’t know his true situation. Remember they met when Richmond applied to join the Knickerbocker. One
