Murder on Washington Square

by Victoria Thompson

  “Another policeman,” he said with disgust. People always seemed to know Frank was a cop.

  “Detective Sergeant Frank Malloy,” Frank said by way of introduction. “And who would you be?”

  “Oliver Walcott,” he replied with a long-suffering sigh. “And I’ve already told the police everything I know about poor Anna.”

  “Then it’ll all be fresh in your mind,” Frank said pleasantly, forcing his way past Walcott into the front hallway. The place was well furnished and cleaner than most such houses.

  “I was just going out,” Walcott protested.

  “I won’t keep you long.” Frank wandered into the parlor, glancing around and taking in every detail.

  Left with no choice, Walcott followed but pointedly did not offer Frank a seat. He took one anyway, on the sofa.

  “You’re the landlord, I take it,” Frank said.

  “My wife and I, yes,” Walcott said.

  “Is your wife in?”

  “No, she’s shopping, I believe. I don’t know when she’ll be back. Mrs. Walcott can spend the entire day shopping if she sets her mind to it.”

  “Then I’ll come back later and talk to her,” Frank said. “Now why don’t you tell me everything you know about Anna Blake?”

  Walcott surrendered with bad grace, seating himself on a chair opposite Frank, but perching on the edge, as if only planning to stay there a few moments. “Anna only lived here a few months. Three or four, I believe, although I can’t be sure. My wife could tell you exactly.”

  “How long did her mother live here with her before she died?” Frank asked casually.

  Walcott’s forehead creased into a frown. “Her mother?” he echoed uncertainly. “I don’t . . . her mother never lived here at all. She’s dead, or so I was led to believe.”

  “Do you know how long ago she died?”

  Walcott considered a moment. “I’m sure I don’t know exactly, but I gathered she’d been gone for a long while. Anna was all alone in the world and had been for some time.”

  No dying mother. No operation. This explained a lot about Anna Blake. “Was she employed?”

  “I . . . not that I know of. Really, Detective, you should be talking to my wife. I didn’t know Anna very well.”

  “She lived in your house,” Frank reminded him.

  “Yes, but I hardly ever do,” Walcott replied.

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “I mean that I travel extensively.”

  “For your business?” Frank guessed.

  “No, I . . . that is, I simply like to travel, and do so at every opportunity.”

  “What business are you in?” Frank prodded.

  Again Walcott hesitated, but Frank thought he seemed slightly embarrassed. “I . . . I don’t have a business. You see, Mrs. Walcott’s family left her a small inheritance. Not a lot, but enough that with our income from our lodgers, I do not have to be employed. She likes staying home and taking care of our guests—I believe they substitute for the children we never had—and I am free to come and go as I please.”

  “How many boarders do you have?”

  “Sometimes we have three, but two usually . . . I mean, Anna was one of them. Catherine Porter is the other, at the moment. Now, I suppose, we only have one.”

  “Then you had an empty room, but I didn’t see a sign advertising it,” Frank noted.

  “Oh, we don’t put out a sign. We prefer to obtain our lodgers by recommendation. We set high standards, you see.”

  “About their ability to pay, I guess.”

  Walcott seemed surprised. “Yes, I suppose . . . Well, of course, we don’t take anyone who wouldn’t be able to support themselves, but we want respectable young ladies, too. If you put out a sign, you never know who might come along.”

  “It’s my understanding that Anna Blake didn’t have a job. How did she convince you she could pay the rent?” Frank inquired.

  “Well, uh, that is . . . You’d really have to ask Mrs. Walcott about that. She handles all the arrangements. I don’t involve myself in such matters.”

  Frank was becoming annoyed with Walcott, but he didn’t let it show. “Tell me what happened the night Anna died.”

  Now it was Walcott’s turn to be annoyed, and he didn’t bother to hide it. “I don’t know what happened. I wasn’t here that night.”

  “Where were you? Traveling?” He managed to make his skepticism known.

  “Yes, I was in Philadelphia.”

  “Can you prove it?” Frank asked mildly.

  Walcott’s face had grown red. “If necessary,” he replied tightly.

  “So you would have no idea why Anna went out that night?”

  “None at all.”

  “Was she in the habit of going out alone at night?”

  “We keep a decent house here, Detective. Any young ladies in the habit of going out at night would be asked to leave.”

  “I guess that means you wouldn’t allow them gentleman callers, either.”

  “In the parlor, where they could be chaperoned,” Walcott snapped.

  “Then can you explain how Anna Black got herself with child?”

  “What?” Walcott looked genuinely shocked.

  “Anna Blake claimed she was with child, and from what I’ve been given to understand, she got that way right here in your house.”

  “I can’t imagine who gave you an idea like that, but it’s completely false. Such a thing could never happen here.”

  “How can you be sure? You said yourself that you don’t spend much time at home.”

  Walcott was insulted now. “My wife would never let such a thing happen either. She’s very careful. She has her own reputation to protect, after all.”

  “Maybe she didn’t know about it,” Frank suggested, but Walcott wasn’t going to be placated.

  “Are you finished with me?” he asked, rising from his chair. “As I told you, I have an appointment and—” The sound of someone knocking on the front door interrupted him, and he signed in exasperation. “I hope that isn’t one of those reporters. There were about a dozen of them outside this morning when we woke up. I thought they were going to break down the door. Poor Catherine, our other lodger, was nearly hysterical with fright.”

  “How did you get rid of them?” Frank asked curiously.

  “I told them the name of the bank where Nelson Ellsworth is employed,” he said, and Frank nearly groaned aloud. So much for protecting Nelson’s employer from the onslaught of the press.

  Frank saw a maid come from the rear of the house to answer the door, and then he did groan aloud because the person she admitted was Sarah Brandt.

  “Malloy,” she said when she saw him through the open parlor door, smiling too smugly for Frank’s taste.

  He rose to his feet, but he didn’t return her greeting as she brazenly came into the room without waiting for an invitation. She waited a moment for him to make introductions, and when he didn’t, she offered Walcott her hand.

  “I’m Sarah Brandt, a friend of Anna Blake’s.”

  Even Frank was impressed with her audacity. Walcott was simply confused.

  “I’m sorry, Miss Brandt, but Anna . . . Something terrible has happened and—”

  “It’s Mrs. Brandt, and I know what happened to poor, dear Anna,” she told him. “I’ve come to see if there is anything I can do to help. I’m sure Mrs. Walcott must be very upset, and I thought I might be of some assistance to her. Is she receiving visitors?”

  “She’s out shopping,” Frank informed her.

  Mrs. Brandt raised her fine eyebrows to express her surprise at such a thing

  “I’ll be sure to tell her you called,” Mr. Walcott assured her hastily.

  “The other lodger is pretty upset,” Frank offered. “Maybe she’d appreciate a visit.”

  Mrs. Brandt’s eyebrows rose higher, probably to express her shock that Frank had asked for her assistance, but she was gracious enough not to betray any other reaction.


  “Are you a friend of Miss Porter’s, too?” Walcott asked her suspiciously.

  Frank never got to hear what bold-faced lie Sarah Brandt might have told because just then someone else started pounding insistently on the front door.

  “Reporters,” Walcott muttered furiously, and this time he didn’t wait for the maid to answer.

  Striding purposefully back out into the foyer, he opened the door, prepared to do battle with a member of the Fourth Estate. Instead, a very distraught middle-aged man pushed his way into the house. “Where is she?” he demanded.

  Walcott seemed genuinely alarmed. “This isn’t an opportune time, Mr. Giddings,” he said, hurrying over and closing the door to the parlor in Frank’s face. But if he’d thought the act would give him privacy, he was mistaken.

  “Don’t try to stop me,” Giddings shouted, his voice clearly audible through the door. “I have to see her. Where is she?”

  “She isn’t here,” Walcott said anxiously. “You must leave. The police—”

  “Don’t threaten me with the police! Do you think I give a damn about them? I’ve got to see her. Anna!” he cried. “Anna, come down here!”

  Walcott said something Frank couldn’t understand, and then he heard the sounds of a scuffle. In another moment, footsteps pounded up the stairs, and Giddings was calling for Anna again.

  Frank exchanged a questioning glance with Mrs. Brandt.

  “I think you should be the one to deal with him,” she said generously. “I’ll see if I can find out anything from the maid.”

  It galled Frank, but he said, “See if that other girl lodger is still here. Maybe she knows something, too.”

  Frank opened the parlor door and found Walcott staring helplessly up the stairs, as if unable to decide upon a course of action. Giddings was throwing open doors on the second floor and calling Anna’s name.

  Frank shouldered Walcott out of the way and started climbing the stairs. By the time he’d reached the top, Giddings was standing in the open doorway of one of the rooms, staring stupidly into it. Hearing Frank’s approach, he turned accusingly.

  “Where is she?” he demanded. Then he realized Frank wasn’t Walcott. “Who are you?”

  “Detective Sergeant Frank Malloy with the New York City Police,” he said. His tone wasn’t particularly menacing, but it didn’t have to be. Those words were enough to strike fear into a normally law-abiding citizen who had been causing a disturbance.

  Giddings stiffened. “I’ve done nothing wrong,” he insisted.

  “Besides forcing your way into someone’s home?” Frank inquired mildly.

  “I was just—”

  “Who are you looking for?” Frank asked sharply.

  “I . . . Really, it isn’t important.” Giddings was starting to sweat in spite of the coolness of the day. He was probably remembering stories he’d heard about the police and how they treated people they arrested, innocent or not. Frank supposed he owed the press a debt of gratitude for their sensational stories if they put the fear of God into people like this Giddings.

  “Were you looking for Anna Blake?” Frank asked.

  “I . . . Yes, I was concerned about her. I haven’t seen her for several days and—”

  “What is your relationship to her?”

  Giddings needed a moment to think about that. “We’re . . . that is . . . She’s my fiancée,” he finally decided. He sounded oddly defensive.

  Frank did not betray his surprise. “Then I suppose you haven’t seen the morning papers.”

  “What does that have to do with anything?” Giddings asked impatiently.

  “Because if you had, then you’d know . . . Well, I’m sorry to have to tell you, but Anna Blake was murdered the night before last.”

  Frank watched his face carefully. He’d interrogated enough people that he knew a genuine reaction from a phony one, and the emotions played across Giddings’s face in exactly the right order. First shock, then disbelief.

  “There must be some mistake,” he insisted, his mind unable to grasp such a horrible truth. “She was . . . She couldn’t be . . .”

  “I assure you, there is no mistake. Anna Blake is dead.”

  For a moment, Giddings couldn’t seem to get his breath. He reached out blindly for the doorframe and grabbed it for support. “How? When?” he asked faintly, the blood draining from his face as he slowly accepted what Frank had told him.

  “Maybe you should sit down first,” Frank suggested. He glanced down the stairs and saw Walcott waiting, listening intently to every word. “Is this Anna’s room?” he asked Giddings, nodding toward the doorway where he stood.

  The man nodded. Frank found it interesting he knew this fact if he’d never visited Anna’s room, as Walcott had insisted. He took Giddings’s arm and led him inside, closing the door behind him. Walcott would have to come upstairs and put his ear to the panel if he wanted to eavesdrop.

  There was a chair in the corner of the sparsely furnished room, by the window, and Frank deposited Giddings into it. Then he perched on the edge of Anna’s carelessly made bed and waited. Human nature being what it was, he knew Giddings would break the silence very soon.

  Frank took the time to study Giddings. His clothes were good quality. He was a man accustomed to dressing well, although his suit was a bit wrinkled, and his linen far from fresh. He’d been wearing it more than one day, which was probably unusual for a man of his obvious position in life. His hat was on crooked, and he hadn’t thought to remove it, a gesture that would have come naturally to him under other circumstances. He was well-fed but haggard, with dark circles under his eyes and a tightness around his mouth. A man of comfortable circumstances who found himself dealing with a crisis he couldn’t resolve.

  Then, to Frank’s surprise, Giddings reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a silver flash. With practiced ease, he removed the top and took a healthy swallow. He didn’t offer to share before placing the flask safely back into his pocket.

  “How did she die?” he asked when he’d given the whiskey a moment to work.

  “Someone stabbed her. It happened in Washington Square.”

  He started in surprise. “Who did it?”

  “We don’t know yet.”

  “But if someone stabbed her in a public place like that, someone must have seen who did it!”

  “It happened at night. No one found her until morning.” He let that sink in, and then he said, “Do you know why she was out alone at that hour?”

  “Of course not!”

  “She wasn’t going to meet you, then?”

  “I’d never expect a female to go out alone at night to meet me,” he insisted, affronted. “That wouldn’t be safe. I always called on Anna here at the house.”

  “You said you were engaged,” Frank reminded him. “When were you planning to get married?”

  Giddings blanched again, proving Frank’s theory that this had been a lie. “I . . . We . . . we hadn’t yet set a date,” he hedged.

  “Is that because you’re already married, Mr. Giddings?” Frank inquired.

  Now Giddings was frightened. “I can’t imagine why that’s any of your business,” he tried.

  “When a woman is murdered, everything about her is my business. Now tell me how you met Anna Blake and what your relationship with her really was.”

  Giddings rubbed a hand across his forehead. When his fingers bumped the brim of his hat, he quickly reached up and removed it, looking at it in amazement, as if he’d never seen it before.

  “How did you meet her, Mr. Giddings?” he prodded.

  “I’m an attorney,” he said, losing what little of Frank’s respect he still had. “Miss Blake came to me with a legal problem. She . . . something to do with a will. She was supposed to have received a legacy when her mother died, but an uncle had produced a more recent will which left everything to him. Anna insisted the second will had been forged, and she needed some legal advice.”

  Anna Blake, Frank realized, had been
a woman with a lively imagination. “Let me guess, she couldn’t pay your fee.”

  “Of course not! She was penniless,” Giddings said defensively. “Her mother had died and her uncle had stolen her inheritance. She had sold all of her possessions to keep herself while she tried to find work, but you know how difficult it would be for a young woman of good family to find a suitable position. She couldn’t earn enough to keep a roof over her head. By the time she came to me, she was desperate. The only choice open to her was to . . . to sell herself. I couldn’t allow that to happen! What decent man could?”

  “So as a decent man, you took her as your mistress instead,” Frank said.

  Somehow, Giddings managed to work up some outrage. The color rose in his face and he started sputtering in protest, but his bluster soon evaporated under Frank’s unrelenting glare.

  “You took her as your mistress,” Frank repeated.

  “No, it didn’t happen like that!”

  “How did it happen?”

  Giddings had nearly ruined his well-made hat in his agitation, but Frank resisted the urge to take it from him. Instead, he sat still and waited. As he expected, Giddings came up with words to fill the silence.

  “At first I just gave her some money. To keep her from the streets, you understand. I felt it was my Christian duty.”

  Anna Blake had inspired Christian duty in many men, apparently. Frank nodded encouragingly.

  “She was very grateful,” Giddings continued more confidently. “She promised she would repay me when she found work, but even when she found a place to take her on, they turned her out after only a few days. She didn’t know how to operate mechanical equipment, and the other girls treated her badly because she was so obviously better than they. The experience completely broke her spirit.”

  “So you gave her some more money,” Frank said. “And eventually you became lovers.”

  “No man had ever been kind to her before,” Giddings explained anxiously. “She fell in love with me! I was all she had in the world. How could a man resist such a temptation?”

  “How indeed,” Frank agreed solemnly. “I expect any decent man would’ve done the same in your position.”