Murder on Lexington Avenue (10 page)

A frantic-looking maid admitted them, and to Sarah’s amusement, she instantly began berating Jack for taking so long in fetching her.

“I ran nearly all the way there,” he protested, “but I couldn’t make her run back, now could I? She says she’s a midwife, but I told her nobody here was having a baby,” he added, aggrieved that he’d been sent on a wild-goose chase.

The maid sighed in exasperation. “Go back to the stables, and forget anybody ever spoke to you today.”

Jack made his farewells to Sarah and gave her back her bag. She thanked him for his assistance, and he disappeared into the bowels of the house.

“This way, please,” the maid said to Sarah when he was gone. “Mrs. Wooten is in her room, but that Mr. Malloy wants to see you first.”

She led Sarah up a flight of stairs to what would be the main living area of the town house. Malloy met them at the top of the stairs. He didn’t smile at her. That would have been inappropriate, especially with the maid watching, but she could see the warmth in his dark eyes. Maybe it was just relief, but she doubted it. She didn’t smile either, but she knew he could read the expression in her own eyes.

“Malloy,” she said by way of greeting.

“Thank you for coming, Mrs. Brandt,” he said formally. “Would you step into the parlor for a moment, please?”

Malloy conducted her to a room that opened off the hallway while the maid stood watching, anxiously wringing her hands, as if afraid of what she might be asked to do next.

“That’s all, Annie,” Malloy told her when it became apparent she wasn’t going anywhere.

She turned reluctantly and retreated back down the stairs.

Malloy closed the door behind them. “I was afraid she’d eavesdrop,” he explained.

“What on earth is going on here?” Sarah asked, setting the heavy medical bag down on the floor and taking a quick look around the room. It was fashionably furnished with overstuffed furniture and every sort of knickknack available for purchase. More money than taste had been expended in its decoration, but that could be said of most of the parlors in the city.

“A rich businessman named Wooten got himself murdered on Saturday,” he began.

“The boy who fetched me said he’d had his head beaten in by somebody who tried to rob him at his office.”

“I wish that was what happened,” Malloy said with a sigh.

“What did happen?”

“We don’t know, but it wasn’t a robbery, and it’s starting to look like lots of his friends and relations might have had good reasons for wanting him dead. One of those reasons is why you’re here.”

“Mrs. Wooten is with child, I gather.”

“Yes,” he said grimly, color creeping up his neck. Childbirth was a subject rarely mentioned in polite company, and she knew Malloy especially hated discussing it because his wife had died in childbirth.

“Is the birth imminent?” she asked, choosing her words carefully so as not to embarrass him further.

“Yes, she . . .” He sighed again, hating this whole conversation. “There was a puddle on the floor,” he said, his voice strained.

“Oh, dear, you mean her waters broke?” Sarah said, somehow managing to sound shocked instead of amused at his chagrin. “In front of you?”

Malloy seemed to be gritting his teeth. “In front of me and her sister in-law and her lover.”

“Her
lover
?” Sarah echoed. Not exactly a word she had expected to hear.

“Yes, her lover, who is also apparently the father of the child.”

“Oh, my, I’m beginning to understand what you mean about people having reasons to murder Mr. Wooten.”

“And to make it even more complicated, neither he nor Mrs. Parmer seemed to know she was expecting. Mrs. Parmer is the sister-in-law.”

“They couldn’t tell?” Sarah asked in surprise. “
You
couldn’t tell?”

“No, Mrs. Wooten is a . . . a large woman,” he explained. “They were both very surprised when I told them they needed to send for a doctor.”

“Oh, my,” was all Sarah could think to say.

“And from what I gathered, Wooten couldn’t possibly be the father of the baby, so it has to be the lover.”

“Oh,
my
,” Sarah repeated, feeling stupid but unable to form a more coherent response in the face of such a situation.

“So I need for you to find out if that’s the truth, because it would give Young—that’s the lover—a good reason to kill Wooten.”

“It would give Mrs. Wooten an even better reason,” Sarah pointed out. “Is this Mr. Young still here?” She glanced around, almost expecting to find him crouching behind the sofa.

“No, he left as soon as I was finished with him.”

“That was pretty brazen of him to be visiting her at her house with her husband barely cold.”

“He’s a family friend, the son of Wooten’s business partner,” Malloy said with some disgust. “He’s also at least ten years younger than she is.”

Sarah raised her eyebrows. She was getting very anxious to meet this Mrs. Wooten. “Is that all?”

“No, but that’s all you need to know right now.”

“Are you planning to wait for the baby to come?”

“God, no!” he said, making her smile. “I mean, well, I
would
like to question her children while she’s . . . indisposed.”

“Her children?” Sarah asked. “Surely, little children won’t know anything about their father’s death or their mother’s indiscretions.”

“They aren’t
little
children,” he said. “The girl is sixteen and her brother is older, and the girl, at least, had a reason of her own for wanting her father dead.”

“Good heavens, she’s not with child, too, is she?”

“I hope not,” he said fervently. “But you don’t need to worry about anything right now except Mrs. Wooten. By the way, I told her you’re Felix Decker’s daughter.”

“Why did you do that?” she asked with a frown. Revealing her family heritage could make people uncomfortable around her, not the best situation when she was working.

“Mrs. Wooten didn’t want them to call in a doctor. I think she was afraid of gossip, so I suggested you.”

“I see,” Sarah said, seeing perfectly. If the woman had kept her pregnancy a secret even from her family, she certainly didn’t want the news spread by a family physician. “But she wasn’t willing to have a stranger help her either.”

“No, she wasn’t, so I tried to impress her by telling her who your father is, but no harm done. She didn’t believe me.”

“I’m sure she didn’t. But she did agree to allow me to come?”

“She didn’t have much choice.”

“Which means she didn’t actually agree,” Sarah guessed. “No matter. I’m here now, and if she really is going to have a baby, she should be glad. I guess I better go find out.”

Malloy picked up her medical bag and opened the door for her. They found a middle- aged woman dressed in mourning, standing in the hallway a discreet distance from the door to ensure they understood she hadn’t been trying to overhear their conversation.

“Is this the midwife?” the woman asked Malloy.

“Mrs. Parmer, this is Mrs. Brandt, the midwife I sent for. Mrs. Parmer is Mr. Wooten’s sister.”

“He said you’re Felix Decker’s daughter,” she said doubtfully, looking Sarah over for any signs she might be the offspring of one of the wealthiest and most powerful men in the city.

Sarah knew she would find none. “Yes, I am, but more importantly, I’m a trained midwife. Would you take me to see Mrs. Wooten, please?”

Mrs. Parmer sighed in resignation. “Of course. This way, please.”

Malloy handed Sarah her bag, and she followed Mrs. Parmer down the hall to another set of stairs, leading up to the third floor.

“I must assure you,” she told Sarah when they were out of Malloy’s earshot, “I knew nothing about Valora’s condition. If I had, I most certainly would have . . . Well, I’m not certain exactly what I would have done, but I would have done something.”

Sarah didn’t think she was expected to reply, so she simply nodded and followed Mrs. Parmer up the stairs.

“I can’t imagine what Electra and Leander will think about all this,” Mrs. Parmer murmured.

Sarah blinked at the unusual names. Obviously, someone in the family had been enamored with the Greeks. But she assumed these must be Mrs. Wooten’s children, the ones Malloy wanted to question. “Are they here?” Sarah asked as innocently as she could. “Perhaps someone should explain the circumstances to them.”

“They’re out this afternoon, I’m happy to say, but as soon as they return, I’ll break the news to them as gently as I can.”

Sarah wondered where two young people whose father had just died could possibly have gone, but a noise below distracted her. A beautiful girl was running up the stairs from the first floor and making quite a racket. Mrs. Parmer’s breath caught, and she pushed Sarah unceremoniously aside to hurry back down the stairs to meet her.

The girl was calling something, but she couldn’t make out the words. Mrs. Parmer met her in the hallway below and took her by the shoulders, thrusting her face close to the girl’s, and began to say something.

The girl recoiled. “A baby?” she cried, shaking her head as if such an idea were incomprehensible.

But Mrs. Parmer was nodding, confirming the unthinkable.

The girl made an odd sound, almost like she was strangling, and she pushed past Mrs. Parmer and ran toward the stairs, where Sarah still stood, frozen with indecision.

“Electra!” Mrs. Parmer called, but the girl ignored her.

Sarah stood aside to allow her to pass, but Mrs. Parmer called, “Stop her! Don’t let her pass!” She was running after her in a futile attempt to catch her.

Not wanting to lay hands on the girl and uncertain that she could hold her in any case, Sarah put out her black medical bag at the last possible moment. It struck the girl in the chest, or rather she ran right into it and it stopped her cold and sent her bouncing backward, right into Mrs. Parmer, who also lost her balance and the two of them went careening backward to certain disaster.

F
RANK WATCHED ELECTRA RACING UP THE STAIRS WITH Mrs. Parmer close on her heels. He wasn’t sure what would happen when she caught the girl, but he knew he wanted to be there to take control of the situation. Luckily, he was close enough to stop the two women when they started falling backward. Actually, stopping Mrs. Parmer was enough. She’d already caught the girl. The two of them would have gone down in a heap, but Frank was able to set them back on their feet on the steps with a minimum of manhandling.

“Are you all right?” Mrs. Brandt was asking them solicitously, as if she wasn’t the one who’d caused them to fall in the first place. Well, in all honesty, it was really Mrs. Parmer who’d told her to stop the girl, but still, she could’ve just grabbed her by the pigtails or something.

The girl was struggling against Mrs. Parmer’s grip, trying to get away, to get to her mother.

“Electra, be still!” Mrs. Parmer was saying, trying to turn the girl’s face to hers so she could read her lips.

Electra refused to look at her, however. She was staring at Sarah, having suddenly realized she had no idea who she was. “Who are you?” she demanded.

“I’m Mrs. Brandt,” she said. “I’m the midwife.”

The girl frowned and turned impatiently to Mrs. Parmer. “Who is she?”

Frank realized she hadn’t understood what Sarah said.

Mrs. Parmer did some finger spelling, probably giving the girl Sarah’s name.

Sarah was watching them with a puzzled frown.

“She’s deaf,” Frank told her, knowing the girl wouldn’t hear him.

Mrs. Parmer did, however, and she gave him a black look.

“Why is he here?” the girl asked Mrs. Parmer, nodding at Frank.

“He’s causing trouble,” Mrs. Parmer said angrily.

“I’m so sorry,” Frank said sarcastically, backing down the steps. “Next time I’ll just let you fall down the stairs.”

“Where is Mama?” the girl asked, looking from one of them to the other desperately.

“She won’t be satisfied until she knows her mother is all right,” Sarah said to Mrs. Parmer.

“She’s right,” Frank confirmed. “Let her go up and see her.”

Mrs. Parmer sighed in defeat. “Come with me,” she told the girl, and she started up the stairs. “You’d better come along, too, Mrs. Brandt,” she added. “I’m sure you’ll be needed soon enough.”

Sarah allowed Mrs. Parmer and Electra to pass her. Then she made a face that expressed her astonishment at this whole situation, for Frank’s benefit, and followed them up the stairs.

Biting back a smile, Frank withdrew, determined not to leave the house now until he’d had an opportunity to speak with Electra. In preparation, he returned to the small room where the maid had found writing materials for him and began to compose a message for the girl.

 

 

M
RS. PARMER LED THEM TO ONE OF THE DOORS THAT opened off the upstairs corridor. They entered a lavishly furnished lady’s bedchamber. The shades had been drawn, so they all stopped just inside the doorway to allow their eyes to adjust to the dimness. Then Electra pushed past her aunt and ran to the other side of the room, where a woman reclined on a brocade settee. She wore a silky Chinese robe in shades of blue, which draped her ample figure in generous folds of fabric.

“Mama!” the girl cried as she flung herself at the woman, falling to her knees. “Are you sick?”

Now that Sarah knew the girl was deaf, she was astonished at her ability to speak. The words were oddly pronounced, but Sarah could understand her fairly well.

Mrs. Wooten leaned toward the girl. “I’m not sick. I’m fine,” she said. “You don’t need to worry about me.”

“Aunt Betty said you have a baby!” the girl wailed, then looked around frantically, as if searching for it.

Mrs. Wooten gave her sister- in-law a murderous glare, but Mrs. Parmer glared right back. “Annie already told her something was wrong with you,” she explained. “I just told her what it was.”