Murder on Fifth Avenue

door and set it outside for the maid to get. Schooling her expression to reveal nothing of what she was feeling, she returned to Garnet and sat down beside her.

“Are you all right?”

“What do you care?”

“I care very much. I know what Devries did to you, Garnet. No one would blame you for stabbing him.”

Her head jerked up. “What do you mean?”

“I know he came in here that morning. Did he try to rape you again?”

Garnet simply stared back at her with hate-filled eyes.

“No one would blame you for trying to protect yourself. We know you didn’t mean to kill him.”

“What do you mean, we know? Who are you talking about?”

“Mr. Malloy and I. Roderick knew what had happened, and Paul had to protect you, so he put the poison in the whiskey and gave it to him—”

“No! Paul would never do such a thing!”

“Are you sure?”

Plainly, she was not. She jumped up and ran to the door in the far wall that must lead to his bedroom and threw it open. “Paul!”

“He’s not there. He’s with Mr. Malloy.”

FRANK BIT BACK A CURSE. THE LAST THING HE WANTED was Mrs. Devries’s interference.

“This doesn’t concern you, Mother,” Paul said.

“If it’s happening in my house, it concerns me. What are you doing to my son?”

“I was only asking him some questions.”

“Then why were you shouting?”

“I was shouting, Mother. I’m sorry I disturbed you.”

Mrs. Devries glared at Frank. “I want you to leave my house this instant.”

“I believe it’s your son’s house now,” Frank said.

She turned to Paul. “Are you going to allow him to speak to me like that?”

“If you leave, he won’t be able to speak to you at all.”

She gasped in outrage. “Is this the way you treat your mother after all I’ve done for you?”

“Mother, please, this is between me and Mr. Malloy.”

“I won’t have it, I tell you. I won’t have him coming here and upsetting you.”

“I’m not trying to upset him,” Frank said, hoping if he remained calm, she would calm down as well. “I just needed to ask him some questions about Roderick.”

“Roderick? What could he possibly know about Roderick?”

“He was the last person to speak with him before he died.”

“Of course he was! I told him to dismiss the worthless idiot. I was tired of paying him a salary for sitting around and doing nothing.”

“Mr. Malloy thinks someone poisoned Roderick because he knew who stabbed Father.”

“That’s absurd! I told you before, Roderick committed suicide.”

“Why would he do a thing like that?”

“How should I know? And why should anyone care? He was just a servant.”

“Mother, please!”

Frank didn’t know how much longer he could be civil to this horrible woman, but before he could completely lose his temper, Garnet appeared in the open doorway.

“Paul! Don’t say anything to him!” she cried and ran to him.

“Garnet, what…?” He looked up and said, “Sarah?”

Sarah had followed Garnet into the room. She cast Frank an apologetic look.

“Garnet, what are you thinking?” Mrs. Devries said. “You aren’t even dressed. Go back to your room at once!”

Garnet seemed not to have heard. She had grabbed Paul by the lapels. “Don’t say anything to them!”

“Don’t say anything about what?” Paul asked in exasperation.

“About Roderick,” Sarah said. “We know what you did.”

Frank stepped over to her and said very quietly, “I’m not sure we do.”

She looked at him in surprise, but no one was paying any attention to them.

“I didn’t do anything to Roderick, as I was just explaining to Mr. Malloy,” Paul said.

“Of course you didn’t. The man killed himself,” Mrs. Devries said.

“That seems unlikely,” Frank said, “since he knew who had stabbed Mr. Devries.”

Everyone turned to him in surprise.

“If he did, why didn’t he say so?” Mrs. Devries scoffed.

“I think he was hoping to blackmail Paul into keeping him on,” Frank said.

“But now we know who did it, too,” Sarah said.

Frank blinked. “We do?”

“Yes,” she told him. “I found it under her bed.” Sarah looked at Garnet. “I know you stabbed Mr. Devries.”

Garnet stared back at her blankly, but Paul said, “No! She didn’t! I’m the one who stabbed him!”

Garnet and his mother both cried, “Paul!” but he ignored them.

“I did it. He was saying awful things to me, and I stabbed him. I didn’t mean to kill him, and he hardly flinched. In fact, he laughed at me. Yes, that’s right, he laughed at me, and called me a…Well, he called me a terrible name, and I ran out of the room. I had no idea how badly he was hurt.”

“Paul!” his mother screamed in anguish, clapping her hands to her ears as if trying to block out his words.

“He’s lying!” Garnet said. “He’s trying to protect me. I’m the one who stabbed him. You were right,” she told Sarah. “Devries came into my room to attack me, and I fought him off!”

“You lying little tart!” Mrs. Devries cried. “How dare you accuse my husband of such a thing!”

“I dare because it’s true!”

“It is true, Mother. He as much as admitted it to me. That’s why I stabbed him.”

Mrs. Devries glared at him, breathless in her fury. “Well, he’s dead now, so what does it matter? What matters is you, and you’re not going to take the blame for stabbing your father, not after all I’ve done to protect you!”

“What have you done?” he asked.

“I think I know,” Frank said, as the picture suddenly became clear to him. All of them turned to him. “You poisoned Roderick, didn’t you?”

She glared murderously at him. “Get out of my house, you worthless scum!”

“I think I already reminded you that this isn’t your house anymore. You’re the one who poisoned Roderick, though. Now it all makes sense. You must’ve known how he liked to sample his master’s whiskey. Maybe your husband had complained about it to you, or one of the servants had mentioned it.”

“They did no such thing!”

“He’d already emptied the decanter in Devries’s bedroom, so you refilled it for him. You knew he’d be upset after his conversation with your son, the conversation you ordered your son to have with him. Maybe you even called out to him as he was going up to his room and suggested he take the decanter with him.”

“I never!”

“Oh, yes,” Frank continued, warming to the tale. “That’s why he said someone had given it to him.”

“I thought he said I’d given it to him,” Paul said.

“I lied to you,” Frank said. “He didn’t actually say who it was.”

“There, you see,” Mrs. Devries said. “He lied to you. None of this is true!”

But Paul was looking at his mother as if he’d never seen her before, and Garnet’s lips had curled into a smile of triumph.