“His wife and children dutifully visited him at the Institute earlier in the week, and Shaw’s key—the one he’d been supplied that unlocked the private side entrance—is missing. Maybe one of them took it.”
“They won’t admit to taking that key,” Taylor pointed out.
“No, but we do need to get their alibis for last evening. If they can provide any. I also want to ask them about the threatening individual Shaw reported following him. If Mina isn’t involved in Shaw’s death, despite the evidence against her so far, then maybe that person is,” said Nick. “Maybe they’d intended to do more than simply scare Shaw, Taylor. Maybe they’d wanted him dead. And now he is.”
• • •
“Mrs. Davies, you’re back,” said Mina.
“That I am,” said Celia. She’d stopped in at home to ensure that Barbara’s new tutor had arrived, disappointing Addie when she’d not paused to talk about Mina’s situation. “I hadn’t a chance to check on you earlier this morning. You were still asleep.”
Mrs. Cascarino vacated the chair next to the sickbed. “Did that policeman leave?”
“He left a while ago, Mrs. Cascarino,” said Celia.
“Nick? I thought I heard his voice,” said Mina, elbowing herself upright, the color in her face draining from the effort.
Celia gently eased Mina back against her pillows. “Mina, you must not try to get up.”
“Her stomach is still . . .” Mrs. Cascarino gesticulated to indicate nausea. “But her head does not hurt her so much. And she cannot remember—”
“I can answer for myself, Mama,” said Mina. “I’m still woozy, Mrs. Davies. And confused.”
“My poor piccola.” Mrs. Cascarino bent down to arrange the pillows propping up her daughter’s back. While Celia had been next door, someone had dressed Mina in a clean white nightgown, her black hair worked into two plaits that hung down over her shoulders. The braids made her seem childlike, as young as her little sister, peeping around the edge of the bedchamber doorframe.
“Your recovery needs time.” Celia glanced at Mrs. Cascarino. She’d gone to speak with Mina’s little sister and her back was turned, but she still had ears. “Mina, I have an important question. Do you recall going to the Hygienic Institute yesterday?”
“What is this place?” asked Mrs. Cascarino, rushing back to Mina’s bedside. “This . . . this institute?”
“I can’t . . .” Mina pressed her palm to her forehead. “I can’t remember.”
“Mrs. Davies, you see? She has pain. Her head, it hurts her.” She scowled. “Please do not ask questions.”
“Mrs. Cascarino, perhaps you can help me and fetch a fresh pitcher of water?” Celia motioned at the nearby pottery jug. “For Mina. If you will.”
The woman grabbed up the jug. “Do not ask my Mina questions. She is sick,” she said and stomped off.
Celia waited for Mrs. Cascarino’s footsteps to fade then scooted her chair nearer to the bed. “Mina, I must know if you can remember planning to meet Mr. Ambrose Shaw at the Institute last night.”
Mina’s eyes searched Celia’s face. “Ambrose?”
“So you do know him.”
“He’s been in occasionally. At Bauman’s.”
“Does he give you gifts?” Like chocolates from a confectioner’s? “Flirt with you?”
“He’s never given me gifts,” she said. “Who’s said he has?”
“Mr. Greaves.”
“Nick’s wrong about that.” Mina hugged her arms about her waist. “Why does it matter if I know Ambrose Shaw? What’s happened?”
Why not tell her? The news might even be written about in the Italian papers. “Mr. Shaw has died, Mina.”
“Oddio!” She blanched. “How?”
“His heart failed,” said Celia. “But the police believe his death may not have occurred naturally.”
“And I’m to blame?”
“A guest of the Institute saw someone outside his room last night,” she said. “And your blue shawl was found in the alley near an unlocked door to the building.”
“My shawl?” Her gaze scoured the bedchamber. “It’s got to be here. I never went to visit Ambrose Shaw at the Hygienic Institute. Why would I go see him? That’s not what happened. Or did it?” Her brow furrowed. “Why am I so confused? Why don’t I know what I did?”
“Concussions can cause amnesia, Mina,” said Celia. “But you believe you never visited him there earlier this week, or were given a key.”
She rubbed her temples with her fisted hands. “I do remember leaving Bauman’s early last night. And I remember coming home. That’s all. I never went to visit him. He didn’t give me a key.”
“Last night, you kept mumbling the word ‘terrible,’” said Celia. “Do you recall saying that? What it was that happened?”
“No. Honestly, I don’t.”
Celia sat back. She was accomplishing nothing by questioning Mina, who was not the only person who needed to be patient with her recovery. Patience and time. But, at the moment, she could spare little of either. She needed proof that shawl was not Mina’s.
“Where is the clothing you wore last night, Mina? Maybe your shawl is with your dress and other things.” The checked tan gown Celia remembered Mina wearing last evening was not in the bedchamber.
“My bedroom, maybe? The one I share with my sisters. At the end of the hallway,” she said.
Celia exited the room, relieved to see that the door to Mina’s bedchamber stood open and she would not need to explain why she wanted access. Her sister followed Celia inside, the little girl’s eyes wide and watchful.
“You have all been taking such good care of Mina,” said Celia, though she doubted the child understood all but a few words of English. Mina’s dress, along with a pair of mended stockings and a thick petticoat, lay on the largest bed, tucked against the wall beneath the window. “Your sister will recover all the more quickly because of your love and kindness.”
The girl, barefoot, padded over to the bed and stared as Celia lifted the gown. The shawl was not beneath it, nor anywhere else in the room. Gad. Maybe the shawl the police had found was Mina’s after all.
“Is this not a lovely, lovely dress?” she asked Mina’s sister, whose unblinking gaze hadn’t shifted away from Celia’s face for a single instant. “Your sister is so fortunate to own a dress so fine.”
Celia held the gown in her hands, afraid of her next step. The step that might prove more damning than the lack of a blue shawl in this room. Running her hands over the gown, she searched for a pocket and found one, discreetly sewn into the side seam. She felt a lump and reached inside. Cool metal met her touch, and a chill swept over Celia. It was a key. An ornate brass key.
Bloody hell.
Chapter 5
“Why did Miss Mina have some key in her pocket, ma’am?” asked Addie, moving to the far end of the porch, away from the open parlor window that might permit Barbara or her tutor to overhear. “She canna be connected to this politician’s murder. I’ll nae believe it.”
“I wish I had an answer, Addie,” said Celia, wrapping her crimson shawl tightly around her body even though the day was mild. “Perhaps it is not the key to the Institute that Mr. Greaves is looking for and there is a completely innocent explanation. She did not recognize the key when I showed it to her, however, but that might be expected, due to her amnesia.”
“Plus, the shawl the police discovered might not be hers,” said Addie. “And that box of candy Mr. Greaves noticed might not be hers, either.”
“Very true, all of that.” Celia glanced at the newspaper Addie had tucked under her arm. “The news of Mr. Shaw’s death has not made it into the papers yet, has it?”
“Not that I’ve seen, ma’am. I was hoping there’d be an update from Mr. Twain and his excursion to the Holy Land, but there isna one yet,” she replied, tapping the newspaper. “How strange, though, that only a week ago, I read about a poor woman whose heart stopped because of chloroform used by her den
tist. A story like that could give people ideas.”
Especially if that person was aware that Mr. Shaw had a weak heart.
“It might have done,” said Celia, grateful her housekeeper was such a keen reader of newspapers.
“Nonetheless, Miss Mina canna be responsible, no matter the key you found,” said Addie, bound and determined to defend the young woman. “I suppose you have to tell Mr. Greaves, though. The evidence canna be kept from the police. Doing that would make us—”
“Accomplices,” finished Celia. “Yes, Addie, I shall have to inform him at some point.” After I discover whether it works the lock on that private door.
“Will you need me to collect your portrait from Miss Shaw, then, because you are busy tending to Miss Cascarino?” asked her housekeeper. “Miss Shaw sent a note that it is ready.”
“Mina’s family is providing excellent care, which means I have the time—and the perfect excuse—to return to Miss Shaw’s studio and ask some questions,” said Celia. “I may be gone for a while, so do not worry about me.”
“Wait, you mean to interrogate the fellow’s daughter?” asked Addie, her voice full of disapproval.
“Rebecca Shaw is the only one of the Shaw family members I know,” she said. “The woman is as good a place as any to begin my search for the man’s real killer.”
Addie eyed her skeptically. “So long as she’s not the killer herself, ma’am.”
• • •
“Detective Greaves, Officer Taylor, this is my son, Leonard,” announced Mrs. Delphia Shaw with a half-hearted flip of her hand.
She had high cheekbones, made pallid by the inky blackness of her brocade gown. Her skin was remarkably free of the sorts of wrinkles that had creased Nick’s mother’s face. Wrinkles from too much time exposed to the winds and the sun. Too much worry brought on by life with an unforgiving husband.
Leonard Shaw greeted Nick and Taylor with a brief, grim smile. He was tall, lean, and muscular for a man who worked in an office all day as a banker. His dark suit of clothes was made of high-quality material, tailored to fit perfectly. “Gentlemen.”
“‘Gentlemen’?” muttered Taylor at Nick’s back. “Well, there’s a first.”
Shaw slid closed the drawing room pocket doors and crossed to where his mother sat, the massive wing-back chair she occupied a monstrosity of gold-and-red brocade. There were touches of gilding everywhere in the drawing room—the frames on the paintings hanging from the picture rail, the candlesticks on the mantel, the clock. Nick wondered if the choice in furnishings reflected Mr. Ambrose Shaw’s taste or hers.
“Perhaps you can explain why you and your fellow police officer are here, Detective Greaves,” said Leonard Shaw. “My father . . . my father perished from a sudden failure of his heart.”
“Our condolences, by the way, Mr. Shaw,” replied Nick.
“Thank you, but why are the police interested?”
“They are suspicious, Leonard,” said Mrs. Shaw. Two large jet earrings dangled from her earlobes, bumping against her square jaw each time she moved her head. They matched the jet brooch pinning her neckerchief. She might be in mourning, but she wasn’t about to neglect her appearance. “What else?”
Her tone was sharp, and her son flinched. Up close, Nick could see how much the fellow resembled his mother, his equally square jaw, broad face. Shaw had been to a barber already that morning; he smelled of bay rum.
“Do you mind if we all sit down, Detective?” asked Shaw, indicating the nearby sofa and chair. He groaned as he lowered onto the chair. “I’m still in shock over my father’s death. I only heard the news thirty or so minutes ago, when I returned from my morning appointments. From another policeman.”
Nick removed his hat and took a seat on the sofa. “News like this is never easy to hear, Mr. Shaw.”
Taylor found a spot to stand near the fireplace where the Shaws wouldn’t notice him taking notes.
“Maybe you can explain what you’re suspicious of, Detective,” said Shaw.
“I’ll get to that, Mr. Shaw,” he said. “You both went to visit Mr. Shaw at the Institute earlier this week. How did he seem?”
“He was enjoying his little holiday away from the cares of the world,” replied Mrs. Shaw.
“Not anxious or agitated?”
“Detective Greaves, these questions are distressing my mother,” said her son. “We’re mourning the loss of my father and a great man. This is no time for the police to be nosing around.”
“He was untroubled, Detective,” said Mrs. Shaw, her voice awfully steady for somebody who was supposed to be distressed. “My husband was not someone easily agitated, or who’d find himself in low spirits. Ambrose was strong-willed and optimistic. Which is why he wasn’t initially interested in visiting the Institute, thinking he didn’t require Mr. Ross’s services, but I convinced him that the treatments would be best for his health. He had many goals to achieve, Detective, and neither of us wanted him to have to slow down.”
“I suppose the Institute’s private entrance was convenient for you and your husband to make use of, Mrs. Shaw,” said Nick. “A good way to keep from being observed by people out on the street.”
“What private entrance?” she asked, looking over at her son as though he’d been remiss in not mentioning it.
“You weren’t given a key for it?” Nick asked.
“No,” she replied.
Leonard Shaw shook his head. “Mr. Ross never provided me or my mother with a key to some private entrance, Detective Greaves.”
“Why was Mr. Shaw staying overnight at the Hygienic Institute instead of returning home each day?” he asked.
“Mr. Ross explained that the treatment would be most effective if Ambrose stayed for the week, where his diet and the quietness of his mind could be best monitored,” she said. “He was supposed to come home tomorrow.”
Taylor flipped a page of his notebook, the snap of the paper startling her.
“Detective Greaves, I’m still trying to understand why you’re asking questions,” said Leonard Shaw. “We were told my father had a heart attack. Didn’t he?”
“Mr. Shaw came into the police station last week to report that he was being followed.” Nick slid the brim of his hat through his fingers, turning it in slow circles. The movement was a habit of his, but he’d discovered its ability to unsettle folks he was interviewing, so he’d never tried to break himself of the mannerism. “What can either of you tell me about that?”
“My husband didn’t want me to be alarmed, but in the past few weeks, on more than one occasion, he noticed someone trailing him when he was out in the evening.” Delphia Shaw pressed her lips together for a second before going on. “At first, he thought he was imagining things. But by the third or fourth occurrence, he decided to go to the police.”
“Who didn’t act interested in investigating,” added her son.
“Did Mr. Shaw ever suggest a reason somebody might be following him?”
“Ambrose kept his own counsel,” said Mrs. Shaw. “But Leonard and I developed a theory.”
“And?”
“We’re convinced that Mr. Elliot Blanchard had either been following Ambrose or had hired someone to,” she said.
“Who is Elliot Blanchard?”
“You haven’t heard of him?” asked Shaw. “He plans to run against my father in the upcoming elections, and he’s done everything he can to ruin my father’s chances.”
“Planned, Leonard. Not plans,” said Mrs. Shaw. “Your father has passed, if I need to remind you.”
“Why would Mr. Blanchard try to frighten your husband by stalking him, ma’am?” asked Nick.
“You’d have to ask him, Detective,” she replied. “The fellow’s a scoundrel.”
“Opposing your husband’s politics doesn’t make him a scoundrel, Mrs. Shaw,” said Nick.
“He is a scoundrel, Detective,” she asserted, her eyes narrowing. “Mr. Blanchard has run scathing articles in the newspaper and conf
ronted my husband in public with the worst insults. I urged Ambrose to take out a complaint against the man, report him to the police, but he resisted. He laughed off my suggestion, saying that arguing about citizenship and universal suffrage heated men’s blood and to not worry, since Mr. Blanchard’s party was not going to win. And it didn’t in the recent elections, so Ambrose was correct. People do not want citizenship nor the right to vote extended to former slaves in every state in this country.”
Taylor grumbled, but he was too far away for Nick to hear exactly what he’d said.
“Elliot Blanchard started a brawl inside the billiard room at the Bank Exchange. Struck my father with his walking stick,” said Leonard Shaw. “So you can understand why we’d accuse him of stalking my father, Detective Greaves.”
“Mr. Blanchard is a violent man,” said Mrs. Shaw. “A man who undoubtedly decided that insults and attacks weren’t enough to stop my husband from pursuing his political ambitions. So he moved on to threatening behavior. A coward.”
“Eventually your husband did file a complaint, though,” said Nick.
“He did. Late last week,” said her son. “I wonder if Blanchard found out.”
I do, too. “While Mr. Shaw was staying at the Institute, did he report seeing Blanchard or tell you he thought he was being watched?”
Mrs. Shaw’s eyes widened. “Mr. Blanchard went to the Institute and frightened Ambrose to death, didn’t he? Caused my husband’s heart to fail.”
“Mr. Shaw’s death is suspicious, ma’am,” said Nick. “That’s all I’m able to say.”
“Blanchard has to be responsible for my father’s death, Detective,” said Leonard Shaw. “He must be arrested.”
“We’ll speak with the fellow, Mr. Shaw, and see what he has to tell us,” said Nick.
“Undoubtedly he’ll lie to you, Detective Greaves,” he said.
Nick kept his hat brim turning through his fingers. “Do you mind if I ask where you both were last evening between the hours of seven and eight?”
No Darkness as like Death Page 6