Murder in Morningside Heights (A Gaslight Mystery) (14 page)

“That’s very impressive. Congratulations.”

“Don’t say anything to my parents. I don’t . . . They don’t want to think about me at a time like this.” He glanced up at the portrait again.

“I’m sure they’ll be pleased. It might even cheer them up a little.”

But Luther shook his head. “They won’t care. They just care about . . . well, books and things. But words and numbers, they never made much sense to me.” He leaned forward and stared straight into Frank’s eyes, as if determined to make him understand. “They said I was just lazy and didn’t try, but I’m not lazy. I work really hard at gymnastics. I know how to work. But it didn’t matter how hard I tried. I just couldn’t get it. Did you ever hear of anything like that?”

Frank remembered that Luther thought he was a professor. “Lots of people aren’t good in school but are good at other things.”

Luther nodded. “I knew it.”

“Luther!” They both looked up to see Cornelius Raymond standing in the doorway, frowning in disapproval. “Your mother is asking for you.”

Luther winced but he got to his feet. “Excuse me.”

Frank nodded, then nodded to Raymond, who glared back. When Luther reached him, he said, “Why were you talking to him?”

Then they walked out and Frank didn’t hear Luther’s reply. Raymond was going to tell Luther who Frank was and make him feel bad for confiding in him. Frank was sorry for that, but not too sorry, because he now understood how frustrated Luther Northrup must have been all of his life to have his little sister excel at all the things he couldn’t do. Could he have
become so frustrated a week ago that he’d murdered her in the heat of passion, as Miss Billingsly had said so well?

Frank fervently hoped not.

*   *   *

S
arah had fixed herself a plate and was nibbling at it in a corner of the dining room when Irene Raymond saw her. She wasn’t happy. “Is it really necessary for you to be here?”

“Is it really any of your business?” Sarah replied as kindly as she could.

Irene flinched in surprise. Obviously, she hadn’t expected a reply like that. “Abigail was my dearest friend.”

“Then you should be glad someone is trying to find out who killed her.”

“I am, of course, but you can’t expect to find that person here. These are all the people who loved her.”

Sarah thought of Miss Billingsly and Professor Pelletier, who certainly hadn’t loved her, but she said, “People are murdered by their loved ones every day.”

“What a terrible thing to say!” she said, trying to keep her voice low but not succeeding very well.

“Terrible but true. Miss Raymond, Mr. Malloy and I are trying very hard not to draw attention to ourselves or cause the Northrups any embarrassment, but you’re making that difficult.”

Irene clapped a hand over her mouth and glanced around. Sure enough, several people were looking at them curiously. “I . . . I’m sorry. It’s just . . . It’s so terrible . . .” Her voice broke and she began to weep.

Sarah hastily found a spot to set down her plate and put her arm around Irene. “It is terrible, and you have every right to be angry.” She guided her out into the hallway, away from the curious onlookers.

Irene had pulled out her handkerchief and was making use of it. Sarah led her to a corner by the stairs, near the kitchen door, away from the crowd. “Do you want me to get someone for you?” Sarah asked.

Irene shook her head and blew her nose. “No, I’ll be fine. I just . . . I’m so frightened.”

“I really don’t think you have anything to worry about. Whoever killed Abigail wouldn’t—”

“I’m not afraid of being murdered,” she snapped, angry again. “I’m afraid to find out who it is. In fact, the more I think about it, the surer I am that I don’t want to know at all.”

“Because you think it’s someone you know?”

“Why can’t it be a stranger? Someone who was trying to rob her or . . . or attack her or something?”

“Because she wasn’t robbed, and she wasn’t attacked, not that way.”

Irene shook her head. “I know. I know all that. It’s just . . .” She looked up at Sarah and grabbed her arm in a painful grip. “Abigail wasn’t always . . . nice.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean she was rather . . . selfish. Not cruel, not really, but she had a strict idea of the way things should be, and she could be nasty when someone didn’t meet her standards.”

Sarah felt sure Irene had borne the brunt of Abigail’s nastiness a time or two. “And you think she might’ve made someone angry enough to . . . to do what they did?”

“I know she could. She’s made me angry enough to throttle her, and if she did it to the wrong person . . .”

And Sarah was certain she had. “Thank you for telling me this.”

“But if she drove that person to it . . . It wouldn’t be that person’s fault, would it? Not really.”

“That isn’t my decision to make.”

“Please, Mrs. Malloy . . .”

But Sarah never learned what she was going to ask. Suddenly, her brother loomed over them. “What’s going on here?”

“Nothing!” Irene said, and Sarah thought she almost sounded afraid.

“Your sister was upset. I brought her out here so she could compose herself.”

“And you’re probably the one who upset her,” he said.

“No, she wasn’t,” Irene said. “I just started crying, thinking about poor Abigail, and I couldn’t stop. Cory, will you take me home?”

Sarah stepped out of the way, earning a glare from Raymond, but he took his sister’s arm tenderly. “Of course.”

Irene gave her a beseeching glance as she walked away. Sarah only wished she knew what it was for.

*   *   *

T
hey caught the train back to the city that evening. Taking advantage of a nearly empty car, they flipped a seat back so Gino could sit facing them for the trip.

“I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary,” he reported. “I guess everybody in town knew about the funeral. A lot of folks made a point of walking by the house and some of them even stopped to get a better look, but it was mostly families or couples. Nobody who looked like he escaped from the asylum and was hunting for somebody else to murder.”

“That’s good to know, Gino,” Frank said, not bothering to hide his grin.

“I saw you talking to the brother, though. What’d he have to say for himself?”

“You talked to Luther?” Sarah asked in surprise.

“Yeah. He’s a sad case, I’m afraid.”

“He didn’t look very sad at the funeral,” she said. “He was practically the only one in the room who wasn’t crying.”

“He might be glad she’s gone. From what he said, his family thought he was a lazy bum, so compared to the outstanding Miss Abigail, he looked even worse.”

“He did say he wasn’t a scholar when I saw him at Miss Wilson’s house the other day,” she said.

“From what he told me, he’s dumb as a post, at least when it comes to books and school.”

“How did he happen to mention that?” Sarah asked.

“He thought I was one of the professors from the Normal School. He wanted to know if I’d ever heard of somebody who tried really hard but couldn’t do well in school.”

“What did you tell him?”

“I told him I did. I didn’t do well in school myself.”

She smiled at that. “Maybe he should become a detective.”

“Too late. He’s a gymnast.”

“Is he?” Gino asked, obviously impressed. “Those fellows are really strong.”

“Not only that, but the New York Athletic Club has offered him a job.”

“Doing what?” she asked.

“Probably training fat rich men to be gymnasts.”

“Not gymnasts,” Gino said. “They train them to be physically fit, though. He’d probably know all about that.”

“How do
you
know all about it?” Sarah asked.

“When I was in the army in Cuba, we had a lot of rich New York boys with us. They belong to clubs like that.”

“Roosevelt recruited the sons of all his rich friends for the Rough Riders,” Frank reminded her.

“And we had weeks and weeks of doing nothing but training to talk about things,” Gino added.

“I see,” Sarah said. “I guess that would be a good job for someone like Luther, then.”

“Not something that would impress his parents, though,” Frank said. “According to him, they’re only impressed by academic accomplishments.”

“So he had good reason to resent his sister,” Gino said.

“And maybe he had good reason to hate her,” Sarah said. “I had an interesting conversation with Irene Raymond. She told me that Abigail could be nasty to people who didn’t meet her standards.”

“Nasty?” Gino echoed in surprise.

“Her exact word. I didn’t have any trouble believing her either. I’ve known women like that. They’re usually bright and accomplished and do everything perfectly, and they don’t have any patience for those who don’t.”

“Nobody else said anything about that,” Frank said.

“Probably because people don’t like to speak ill of the dead,” Sarah said. “Especially when they’ve died tragically.”

“I guess Bathsheba doesn’t care about speaking ill of the dead, because she said something like that, too. I didn’t think much of it at the time, because I thought she might’ve just imagined it since she hated Abigail so much, but she said Abigail only cared about people who could do something for her. She also thought Abigail made fun of Miss Billingsly when she was talking to Miss Wilson in French.”

“Sounds like she was a piece of work. So maybe she was lording it over her brother for years, and he finally couldn’t stand it anymore,” Frank said.

“That’s easy to imagine, isn’t it?” Sarah said. “Irene even asked me if Abigail had goaded someone until they were angry enough to kill her, would it really be that person’s fault?”

“What did you tell her?” Gino asked in amazement.

“That it wasn’t my place to judge, of course, but it’s an interesting question. She must also be thinking Luther could have done it.”

“Maybe not,” Frank said. “Don’t forget, Irene’s own brother also had a reason to be angry with Abigail, and Irene is more likely to be concerned about him than Luther.”

“So the first thing we should do is find out where Luther and Raymond were on the day Abigail was killed,” Gino said.

Frank nodded his approval. “It should be easy enough to check the New York Athletic Club and find out if Luther was staying there last Wednesday.”

“I can do that tomorrow,” Gino said.

“How will you find out about Cory Raymond?” Sarah asked.

“That’ll be harder. He must have a job somewhere. We could check with his office to see if he was at work that day.”

“I think he mentioned the name of the company he worked for in one of the letters we found,” Sarah said. “I’ll find it when we get home.”

“Give the name to Gino, then,” Frank said. “He can go back up to Tarrytown and sniff around.”

Gino’s smile threatened to split his face.

“But let’s not forget about Miss Wilson and Miss Billingsly,” Sarah said. “Miss Billingsly was behaving very strangely today. We had a conversation with them on the way to the cemetery,” she added for Gino’s benefit.

“What did they say?”

“It was more how they were acting. I didn’t expect Miss Billingsly to be sad about Abigail’s death, and yet she was the one who cried the most during the funeral.”

“Maybe she’s the killer and she was crying because she feels guilty,” Gino said.

“That certainly crossed my mind,” Sarah said, “but when
we were in the carriage, she seemed to be baiting Miss Wilson. Is that what it seemed like to you?” she asked Frank.

“Yeah, it did. What was all that about Abigail being like a daughter to them?”

“Miss Billingsly said having Abigail in their house was like having a daughter,” Sarah explained to Gino.

“That would make sense, considering their ages,” Gino said.

“But Miss Wilson took offense for some reason,” Sarah said. “She actually seemed angry.”

“She took offense at most of what Miss Billingsly said,” Frank said. “What do you think was going on?”

“Something private, certainly,” Sarah said. “Something only they understood. Malloy and I believe that having Abigail there somehow ruined their long friendship.”

“Bathsheba thought it did. Like I told you, she thought Abigail set out on purpose to win Miss Wilson over and come between her and Miss Billingsly,” Gino said.

“They certainly don’t seem close now,” Sarah said. “Miss Wilson was appalled that Miss Billingsly was subjecting her to her veiled abuse in front of us. And now that I’ve had time to think about it more, I get the oddest feeling that she was afraid.”

“Who, Miss Billingsly?” Frank asked.

“Yes.”

“Afraid of us?”

“I didn’t get that impression, since she was baiting Miss Wilson right in front of us, and not afraid of Miss Wilson either, but . . . I just don’t know, which is why I’m so confused. What would she be afraid of?”

“The killer?” Gino asked.

“Or maybe finding out who the killer is,” Frank said,
thinking back to the conversation. “It seems like that’s what everybody’s afraid of.”

“The killer would be afraid of that, of course, but why would anyone else?” Sarah asked.

“Maybe because they’re afraid it’s someone they care about,” Gino said.

“But didn’t they all care about Abigail, too?” she argued. “Except for Miss Billingsly, and she’s one of the frightened ones, so she’s probably not the killer.”

“Unless she’s afraid we’ll find out it’s her,” Frank said.

Sarah sighed. “As I said, it’s very confusing. Did either of you get a chance to speak to Pelletier?”

Gino shook his head, and Frank said, “No, I never saw him after we went back to the house. I think he left.”

“That was rude,” Sarah said. “Hardly anyone from the school was there in the first place.”

“They probably think the memorial service at the school is enough,” Frank said.

“Will her family be invited?” Gino asked.

“I hope so, although I wonder if her parents will want to attend,” Sarah said. “Being in the place where she was murdered would be very difficult for them, I’m sure.”

“Maybe they’ll send Luther,” Frank said, earning a scowl from Sarah.