Murder on Astor Place (27 page)

“I don’t know nothing,” he gasped, trying to struggle but failing. Frank had him too far off balance and in too much pain.

“You’re being too modest, Mr. Fisher. I’ll bet you know lots of things. How do you know I’m not going to be asking you something you
do
know? But then,” he added as he dragged Fisher out into the street, “maybe you know perfectly well what I’m here to find out and that’s why you’re so set on running.”

An alley yawned nearby, and Frank hustled him into it, slamming him up against the brick wall and bracing him there with a forearm against his throat. “Now, then, let’s set a few rules. First of all, don’t lie to me, or I’ll have to show you what I know about giving the third degree.”

Fisher made a gurgling sound that might have been a protest, but Frank didn’t really care if it was or not.

“First question: Why were you following Alicia VanDamm?”

Fisher shook his head violently in denial, but Frank merely increased the pressure on Fisher’s throat slightly, until his eyes started bulging in his head. Judging that he’d gone far enough, he released the pressure enough for Fisher to draw a desperate breath.

“We can go down to Police Headquarters if you’d rather,” Frank suggested. “We’ve got rooms there where we can question our prisoners in comfort. Our comfort, you understand, not yours. And I’ve got a cell I can lock you in until I remember to come back to get you. That might be a few days. I’m pretty busy, so you’d do better to answer me now and save yourself some time in the hole. What do you say?”

He could see Fisher was thinking it over, weighing his options. Plainly, he was afraid to cooperate with Frank, but he was also afraid to refuse. Frank decided that whatever he feared Mattingly would do, Frank’s threat had the advantage of being the most immediate. That surely gave him an advantage.

He tried another question, an easier one this time. “Who hired you to follow Alicia VanDamm?”

Whatever loyalty he’d had, evaporated. “Sylvester Mattingly,” he gasped.

This wasn’t news, but at least he’d gotten the boy to tell the truth.

“Why did he want to find the girl?”

“I don’t know. It ain’t my place to ask. I just do like I’m told.”

This was also probably true. “All right, then, if you were supposed to find her, why didn’t you just tell Mattingly where she was? Why did you move into the boardinghouse with her for a week?”

His eyes rolled as he looked around desperately for some escape, but he found none.

“It’s late, and I’m tired, Mr. Fisher,” Frank said. “If you make me exert myself, I’m going to be in a very bad mood.”

“She had something,” he reluctantly admitted.

“Something you were supposed to steal? Her jewelry, maybe?” Would the VanDamms have hired someone just to get the jewels back and the hell with their daughter?

“I never stole nothing! Not no jewelry, anyways,” he added quickly when Frank started to press on his throat again.

“What then?”

“A ... a book.”

This made no sense. “What book?”

“It was a diary, they told me. She wrote in it all the time. I was to find it and make sure I brought it back before they went to fetch her.”

Frank recognized the irony of this. Hadn’t he hoped to find just such a book when he’d searched Alicia’s room last week?

“And did you find it?” he asked.

Fisher rolled his eyes again. Even in the shadows of the alley, Frank could see his fear. And smell it, too. Fisher reeked of it. “I don’t know,” he tried, but Frank was having none of it. He leaned in, bearing down with his forearm again until Fisher was writhing.

After a few moments, Frank released him. “I’m only going to ask you once more, Mr. Fisher,” he said while the boy gasped for breath. “Did you find the diary?”

“I found it, but ...”

“But what?” Frank demanded.

“He said it was the wrong one.”

“Who said?”

“Mr. Mattingly. He said it wasn’t the right book. He said there was another one, and that was the one he wanted, but she hardly ever left her room, so I never had much time to look for it. I didn’t find another one, though, even though I tried. It just wasn’t there.”

This made no sense to Frank. “The girl kept two diaries?”

“The one he wanted was the old one. The one she’d had for years. What I found was just from when she’d left home. The old one wasn’t in her room.”

“So you killed her and ran away,” Frank guessed.

“No!”
he cried, his body fairly trembling with fear. “I never touched her! She was alive when I left the house!”

“You’re pretty sure of that, which probably means you killed her.”

“No, no, I swear! I saw her let somebody into her room, and then I got my stuff and left. She was alive then.”

“Who did you let into the house that night? If what you say is true, maybe he was the one who killed her.”

Fisher was quaking now, like a man possessed. Surely, he knew that betraying Mattingly wasn’t the smartest thing he’d ever done. “It wasn’t just a man. He had a woman with him, too.”

“And you know who they are, don’t you?”

“I don’t! I swear!”

“Stop swearing and tell me the truth. Who was the man?”

“I don’t know. Some swell. I never saw him before. Mattingly sent me word he’d be coming that night, and I should let him in. That’s all I know!”

“What did he look like?”

“I told you, a swell. Expensive clothes. Skinny little mustache.”

“Blond or dark?”

“Blond. Talked through his nose, like they all do. Walked like he had a stick up his ass.”

“How old was he?”

“How should I know? Maybe your age. I don’t know for sure. He didn’t really let me get a good look at him, and I sure as hell didn’t care.”

“What about the woman? Did she call him by name?”

“She called him ‘sir.’ That’s all. That’s all I know. Now let me go!”

Frank was pretty sure he knew more. “Just one more thing, Fisher. What are you doing in the Brass Lantern?”

Frank caught a glimpse of the sass that must have been the boy’s stock and trade. “I was trying to get some sleep when you rousted me out.”

Frank gave him a slap. Just a friendly one, nothing serious, just to remind the boy who was in charge and that he knew Fisher was responsible for Alicia VanDamm being dead. “You know what I mean. Mattingly must pay you well enough so you don’t have to sleep in a flophouse. And look at you.” He took in the boy’s dirty clothes and week’s growth of beard with a disdainful glance. “A swell like Mattingly would demand a little more flash from his hired help.”

“I ... I don’t work for him no more,” he insisted.

“And why not? He fire you after Miss VanDamm turned up dead?”

“No, I ...”

“You what?” Frank demanded, raising his hand to strike the boy again. But he didn’t have to.

“I quit!”

“Why?”

“I ... They didn’t say they was gonna kill her! She was a nice girl. They didn’t have no call to kill her!”

Frank didn’t quite believe the boy’s sense of honor had been so badly offended. “And you figured they’d try to pin it on you, didn’t you? That’s why you ran. That’s why you’re living here instead of at your flat.”

The boy was trembling again. “I didn’t touch her, not ever. They went into her room, and I left. Mattingly told me to get out when they came, so I did. When I heard she was dead ... I mean, that’s why you’re here, ain’t it? Because they said I killed her? They’re trying to pin it on me, ain’t they?”

It would’ve been a good idea, Frank thought. In fact, he could have done so himself, just to get the case solved. A boy like this would be an easy target, with no friends to help him. Mattingly certainly wouldn’t, not if he’d framed the boy for the murder. But Frank had a witness who’d seen Fisher leaving the house before Alicia was killed. Or at least when her mysterious visitors were still with her.

“Well?” Fisher asked, his voice reedy with terror.

“I just wanted some information,” he told the boy, releasing him at last.

His legs threatened to buckle, but pride kept him on his feet. Clutching the wall for support, he glared at Frank, or tried to. It was more of a cringe. “You ain’t taking me down to the station house?” he asked, afraid to trust his good fortune.

“I know you didn’t kill the girl, so you can quit running. The police aren’t looking for you. But is somebody else?”

Fear flickered across the boy’s face again. “I couldn’t say.”

“But if you could, you’d say that you think Mattingly and maybe the fellow you let into the house that night are trying to find you so they can say you killed her.”

“Even a fool could see that’s the best thing to do,” he admitted. “Nobody’d believe me over them, not for a minute.”

“I think you can forget about it, then. It only took me a few days to find you, and I wasn’t trying very hard. Mattingly knows how to find somebody in this town. If he wanted to frame you, you’d be in the Tombs by now,” he said, naming the prison building used by the city. They were going to tear the place down, but Frank figured that no matter how modern the new prison was, it would always be called “The Tombs.”

“Maybe it ain’t Mattingly I got to be worried about,” he said quietly. “Nor the Tombs, neither.”

“What do you mean?”

The boy swallowed, trying to get some moisture back into his mouth, and his gaze darted up and down the alley, as if trying to judge who might be the bigger threat, Malloy or some unseen pursuer. “I mean, I know who the swell was who come to her room that night.”

“Who was it? Mattingly?” Frank demanded, resisting the urge to grab the boy again and shake the truth out of him.

But the boy shook his head. “Wasn’t him. It was ...” He looked around again, making sure they were alone. “Well, I heard Miss VanDamm call him ‘Papa.’ ”

A
FOOL’S ERRAND. That’s what Sarah was on. She didn’t even know why she was going back to the VanDamm’s house, but she was getting too restless sitting at home, waiting to hear back from Malloy. She had to do something.

She was hardly down her front steps, however, when someone called a warning.

“Stop, dear, don’t go any farther!” Mrs. Elsworth cried, hurrying down her own porch steps. Apparently, she’d been watching out her front window for something to happen in the neighborhood that would require her attention. “You dropped your glove!”

Sarah looked to see it lying near the top step, and started back for it.

“Don’t pick it up!” Mrs. Elsworth shrieked in terror, causing Sarah to nearly stumble on the steps. “Bad luck, you know!” she explained when Sarah gaped at her.

Sarah swallowed down her exasperation. “Am I supposed to let it lie there?” she asked, trying not to sound sarcastic.

“Of course not!” Mrs. Elsworth said, her eyes wide at such a ridiculous notion. “I’ll pick it up for you. And that’s
good
fortune for you today, to have someone else pick up your glove.”

Amazingly spry for her age, she brushed past Sarah and flitted up the steps, snatching the glove, then handing it back to Sarah with a flourish. “There!”

“Well, thank you,” Sarah said, trying to appear suitably grateful.

“Are you off to help a baby into the world?” she asked, plainly delighted to have been of service.

“No, I have an ... an appointment,” she said, although it wasn’t any truer than it had been the last time she’d said it.

“Nothing serious, I hope.” Her face crinkled in concern.

“Oh, no, it’s just a visit with an old friend.” This was stretching the truth a bit, but Mrs. Elsworth didn’t need to know everything, however much she might wish to.

“With that gentleman who called on you the other day?” she asked coyly.

“I told you, that was a police detective, and he wasn’t calling on me. He’s working on a case, and I was able to give him some information.”

“Of course, dear, whatever you say.” Mrs. Elsworth smiled knowingly. “But I’d wager he
would
be calling on you if you’d give him the slightest encouragement.”

Sarah was hard pressed not to laugh out loud at such a ridiculous notion. “I assure you that Detective Sergeant Malloy barely tolerates me, Mrs. Elsworth, and the feeling is mutual. Once his case is solved, we’ll most likely never set eyes on one another again.”

“Oh, my, young people can be so blind,” she clucked, shaking her head in dismay. “He does seem like a very nice man, Sarah, even if he is a policeman. You mustn’t dismiss him too lightly. You never know where your destiny might lie.”

Sarah thought Malloy had seemed rude and obnoxious that day he’d met Mrs. Elsworth, and she was sure Malloy wasn’t any part of her destiny, but she wasn’t going to argue the point standing on the sidewalk. “I’ll give the matter some thought,” she lied to escape further blandishments.

“I should hope so,” Mrs. Elsworth said. “Now I’d best let you be on your way. Watch the weather, though, dear. There’s a storm brewing, and you don’t want to be caught out in it.”

Sarah glanced at the cloudless sky in surprise. The day was unseasonably warm again, and the air was still. “It doesn’t look like rain,” she pointed out.

“I know, but I tried to light a candle this morning, and the blessed thing just wouldn’t catch. That means a storm’s coming, sure as sunrise. Maybe you should take an umbrella, but ... oh, dear, it’s bad luck to go back once you’ve started out,” she mused. “Oh, I know, I could lend you mine!”

She would have darted off to fetch it, but Sarah stopped her. “I’ll only be gone a short while,” she assured the old woman with a meaningful glance at the clear sky. “That storm must still be a long way off.”

“Just take care that you’re home before it starts,” Mrs. Elsworth warned. “It’s going to be a bad one.”

Sarah was still shaking her head when she reached the comer.