Chapter 16
Derrick’s grip on my arm relaxed. I suppose he thought the shock would immobilize me, but, in fact, it had the exact opposite reaction. Surprising him by whisking free, I hefted my skirts and bulldozed my way past the swarm of police officers and into the house. Vaguely I heard my name being called; from the corner of my eye I saw Jesse beckoning, but I didn’t pause to acknowledge him. My boots clattered loudly on the wide floorboards of the tiny front hall, their echoes clashing with my pounding heartbeat.
Through the parlor doorway, I saw his feet first, toes pointing upward, the tips of his ankle boots reflecting the glow of the many gaslights burning around the room. The heat of all those lamps struck my cheeks and burned my eyes. Or were those tears swimming in my vision and rendering that familiar, handsome face watery and indistinct, as though he floated beneath several inches of water?
“Back away . . . give her a moment.”
Jesse’s quiet order scattered the handful of officials who had been leaning over the body and examining the room. I fell to my knees beside that silent, too-still form, one hand braced on the floor to support my weight while with the other I swept a shock of bright, golden hair off his brow. A brow still so smooth and youthful for a man in his forties. . . .
“Oh, Jack . . . I’m so sorry.” I was sorry for not trusting him, sorry to have played at being a detective. I had thought to save Brady, and all too willingly I would have condemned an innocent man based on . . . what? The fancies of my faulty imagination, fueled, obviously, by pseudo-evidence I was all too eager to credit. Obviously Jack had done no wrong and the killer was still out there.
It struck me a stinging blow that in his final moments, Jack had known who the killer was, and must have confronted him with whatever weapon or evidence he’d found secreted in our playhouse hidey hole. I trembled to consider the terror Jack had faced in those moments, how he might have struggled, wishing he could convey what he knew. . . .
And then I felt it—moisture seeping through the rug and into my palm, enveloping my fingers as they sank into the woven pile of the floral design. I lifted my hand, and the sight of the blood, clotting and matted with rug lint, made my stomach pitch.
His suit coat was closed but not buttoned, I now realized. One of the authorities must have discreetly covered him when I barreled in. Instinct urged me to look away, to stand up and let the police get on with their work. I couldn’t. If Jack had confronted the murderer, then I owed it to him, to my father, and to Brady, to know exactly what happened to him.
From somewhere behind me someone had pressed a dish towel into my bloodied hand. Dully I used it to wipe away the mess, or most of it, because try as I might, I couldn’t erase the rusty traces staining my fingers and caking in the creases of my palm. Would I ever erase those stains? Maybe not.
Still, I set the rag aside and reached for the placket of Jack’s coat.
“Emma, don’t,” I heard from behind me, and realized it was Derrick, down on his haunches, hovering close.
I shook my head and opened Jack’s coat. At first what appeared to be a giant, vibrant rose blossom formed in my gaze—nothing sinister, just a rose! But, no, that couldn’t be right, and as I stared the petals rearranged themselves into angry blotches and splatters, with a vicious entry wound torn at its center.
Quickly I replaced the edges of his coat and turned away . . . to be caught up in Derrick Anderson’s arms.
“Emma, how could any of this be your fault? You need to listen to reason.”
Derrick and I sat at the little round table in the cramped kitchen at the back of Jack’s house. Cups of tea steamed before us, yet neither of us did much drinking. I hunched with my head in my hands while Derrick alternated between rubbing my back and slipping his arm around my shoulders and hugging me close.
His firm touch came as a great comfort to me, which only heightened the guilt coursing through me. How could I possibly be enjoying a man’s embrace when my family’s dearest friend lay dead only two rooms away?
“But don’t you see,” I said without much feeling, “if I hadn’t been running around asking questions, Jack wouldn’t have gotten involved, and he wouldn’t be dead. . . .”
“Nonsense. We don’t even know for sure yet that Jack’s death is related to Alvin Goddard’s—”
“Oh, don’t be obtuse. Of course it’s related. Coincidences like this don’t happen in a town like Newport. Everything here is connected.” My chin sank to the table. “Why didn’t I leave it all to the police?”
That last came out as nearly a wail, and Derrick’s arm went around me again. Softly he shushed and soothed me, or tried to, with whispered words against my ear. His large palm rubbed up and down my arm, and our sides pressed together as he shuffled his chair closer to mine.
“And what’s worst of all, Derrick, is that I suspected him. That’s why I called you today. I was certain Jack was a murderer. Instead . . .” It was then I saw the bloodstains smeared across the folds of my skirt. Jack’s blood. A man who had been as much an uncle to me as Cornelius Vanderbilt. “Oh . . . Jack!”
I hadn’t wanted to cry. I hadn’t thought I deserved to cry. I deserved to suffer my guilt and endure the ache in my heart for as long as it lasted. But as Derrick pressed my face to his neck, I cried and cried, soaking his shirt collar, until a small portion of my pain receded. In the circle of those sturdy arms, I began to feel safer, stronger, more myself.
I lifted my face, no doubt blotchy and swollen, and instantly found a handkerchief pressed into my palm. “It’s clean,” Derrick whispered.
I used it to dab at my eyes. “I’m so sorry—” I tried to apologize, but as I glanced up I found Derrick’s face disconcertingly close to my own. His lips touched mine, and any thoughts I might have expressed flew straight out of my head.
The kiss started gently, as this morning’s kiss had: a cool brush of his lips across mine. He pulled away slightly and our cheeks touched; the surprising softness of his skin felt heavenly against my own. Deeply I inhaled his scent—shaving soap and starch and a clean, outdoorsy essence. He pressed his lips to mine again, and I tasted coffee and mint and a dark promise of excitement, of a passion I could only partly understand.
But as gently as he’d begun, he ended the kiss, pulled an inch or two away, and rubbed his nose across mine. “I like you, Emma Cross.”
My stomach tightened and my heart flipped into my throat. Before I could respond, or even decide how I wanted to respond, there came a throat clearing and a shuffling of feet in the kitchen doorway.
Good heavens, how long had Jesse been standing there? I blushed to the roots of my hair, but Derrick only sat back in his chair and cast an even gaze at the other man. “Do you need something, Officer Whyte?”
Jesse nodded and stepped into the room. “I hate to do this to you, Emma, but I need to ask you some questions. Do you feel up to it?”
I swiped away a remaining tear or two and clutched my trembling hands together. “Of course, Jesse.” I gestured for him to sit at the table with us. He took a seat opposite me, taking out a writing tablet and pencil.
“When was the last time you saw Jack?”
“This morning, at The Breakers. I’d gone to—” I stopped and shook my head to clear it. “Jesse, this is a bit of a long story.”
“Tell me everything, from the beginning.”
And so I retraced my steps for Jesse—the questions I’d asked, the theories I’d formed, the suspects I’d accumulated. With each revelation his frown deepened. He had told me from the first to leave the investigation to the police, and now he knew his warnings had fallen on deaf ears. Though I found myself unable to look him in the eye as I continued my story, I gleaned unexpected courage from the large hand holding my own beneath the table.
“And then I remembered what Reggie said about murder investigations not being child’s play—”
“He was right,” Jesse interrupted pointedly.
“Yes, well, that was when it
occurred to me to check the playhouse at The Breakers. You see, when my cousins and I were children, we used to hide things under the floor. Neily made the hole beneath the flagstones and I thought anyone needing a convenient hiding place the night of the ball might go there, because with all the carriages parked on the front property no one would notice and . . .”
Jesse had been scribbling madly in his tablet. Now he stopped and held the pencil up. “Slow down, Emma. Who knew about this hiding place?”
“All the children, of course. Neily, Gertrude, Reggie . . .”
“So you and your cousins. Anyone else?”
“I suspect Mr. Mason might have known as well. He always seemed to have a sixth sense when it came to us children and—” I gasped and my eyes opened wide.
“Emma? What’s wrong?” Jesse asked at the same time Derrick tightened his hold on my hand and leaned closer.
“Mr. Mason. Good Lord, how can I have forgotten? According to Jack’s maid, he accompanied Jack from home today. He should be here.” I began looking wildly about as if I might find him standing in a corner. “Where is he? Is he anywhere in the house?”
Jesse’s expression became alarmed. He instantly came to his feet and strode from the kitchen; his stern orders to search the entire house drifted in from the other room. Then he returned to the kitchen table.
“I’m still confused, Emma. What does all this have to do with Jack Parsons?”
“When I went to check the playhouse this morning, Jack was speeding out the gates—in a leased carriage. He might have collided with me, he was in such a hurry. Still, I didn’t think much of it until I reached the playhouse and discovered the flagstones had been moved and the hidey hole was empty.”
“And?” Jesse waited, obviously expecting more.
“So whatever was in there, Jack must have taken it.”
“How do you know whatever—if anything—had been in there wasn’t removed before Jack got there?”
This question came from Derrick and I swung my head in his direction. “I . . . he must have . . .”
“Not necessarily,” Derrick said gently. He gave my hand a squeeze. “If Jack knew about the hiding place, one of the Vanderbilt siblings must have told him about it. Who would that most likely have been?”
I started shaking my head, but the sad light in Derrick’s eyes forced me to acknowledge the obvious. “Neily,” I whispered. “He might have told Jack about the hiding place, but that doesn’t mean—”
“Why Neily?” Jesse asked abruptly. “I wasn’t aware that Neily Vanderbilt and Jack Parsons were particularly well acquainted, much less confidents.”
“I didn’t either,” I replied, once more setting my chin in hand. “Not until the other night when . . .” I glanced at Derrick. He nodded. “Not until I discovered that Neily and Jack were both using this house for . . . personal purposes.”
“Such as . . . ?”
“Oh, Jesse, what does it matter?” I almost shouted. “Neily certainly didn’t murder anyone. In fact, is there a telephone in this house? Someone should call The Breakers and find out where Neily is. That would clear him once and for all.”
Without a word Jesse once more left the room. When he returned, another officer trailed him. “Theodore Mason isn’t in the house, sir.”
“Then I want him found. Immediately.”
“Try his boardinghouse,” I suggested. “The Harbor Hill on Broadway.”
Jesse sat back down and picked up his tablet. “Do you have anything else to add, Emma?” When I shook my head, his gaze swerved to Derrick. “And how do you figure into all of this?”
By the time Jesse had finished with us, the body—Jack’s body—had been removed. The police were finishing up gathering the evidence when I went to stand in the parlor doorway. Derrick came up behind him and set a palm on my shoulder.
“We should go, Emma.”
I shook my head and stepped into the room—this room where a part of my own life seemed to have died, vanished. Oh, but not without a trace, for in the middle of the carpet, almost mocking the vital, dynamic man Jack Parsons had been, sat the ugly, rusty stains from the blood that had seeped out of him. There had been two shots, the police determined. One had struck him in the back. Then, as he’d turned toward his assassin, he’d been shot again, this time to the side of his chest, the wound I’d seen when I opened his coat.
Two shots, two moments in time that could never be taken back, done over, changed. The finality of it pressed in upon me until I could barely drag my feet one after the other. And yet I did. Careful not to step into the way of the policemen, I entered the room, walked over to the stains, and looked down, trying, somehow, to disassociate those hideous splotches from the vibrant man I’d known.
“Miss Cross, maybe you shouldn’t be here anymore.” One of the policeman, though who I couldn’t say because I never looked up, gave my arm a pat as he paused before walking by.
No, I didn’t look up, nor was I still staring at the drying remnants of Jack’s life’s blood. My gaze had drifted a few feet away to a long, low cabinet against the wall beside the fireplace. I moved closer to it, stood studying the piece a good long while before I realized what had captured my attention.
“Derrick!”
He was at my side in an instant. “What is it?”
I stretched out a finger. “There, along the edge.”
Before he could respond, I nearly pounced at the cabinet and fell to my knees in front of it. I ran my hand along the gilded edge and quite clearly felt the sharp indentation of the wood, my fingers catching on fine splinters left by whatever hard, wide object had caused the dent.
“Get Jesse,” I said frantically. Less than a minute later he and Derrick stood frowning down at this latest evidence. “It’s a match, I know it is,” I announced adamantly. “This dent and the one in Uncle Cornelius’s bedroom were made by the same blunt instrument. The murder weapon. And it proves Brady’s innocence.”
“Now, wait a minute, Emma,” Jesse said with a shake of his head. “The murder weapon in this instance was a gun. Alvin Goddard wasn’t shot.”
“No, but the weapon used to kill him was here in this room. Don’t you see? Whoever killed Alvin Goddard retrieved the murder weapon from the playhouse, came here to confront Jack, but brought added protection.”
“Or,” Derrick put in, “Jack somehow found out about the murder weapon, retrieved it from the playhouse, and confronted the killer here with it. Someone who knew he owned this house, who maybe wouldn’t have thought twice about being invited here.”
Both men regarded me, their silence all but shouting the words that went unsaid.
“Neily,” I whispered. “But if he thought nothing of being invited here, why would he have brought a gun?”
“For all we know, Emma, Neily might have taken to bringing a gun with him everywhere these days.” Derrick shrugged apologetically. “Maybe he’s feeling penned in and desperate.”
I realized Jesse had turned away to speak to two other officers. Upon hearing my cousin’s name mentioned, I grasped Jesse’s forearm. “Wait one minute. What about Theodore Mason? He had a motive to kill Alvin Goddard, who accused him of stealing from The Breakers. And he should have been here with Jack. Someone needs to find him.”
Jesse agreed. “We need to find both your cousin Neily and Mr. Mason. Right now. Neither one can be overlooked as a suspect. In the meantime, I want you both out of this.” His face became stern. “Understand, Emma? No more investigating. You leave this to me and my men.”
I nodded, and Derrick said, “I’ll see she gets home.”
“I can’t go home yet,” I objected. When Jesse’s expression became exasperated, I quickly said, “I have to see Brady, tell him what happened. He deserves to know, Jesse. Jack Parsons has been as much a part of his life as mine. And my parents . . . I’ll need to wire them the news. . . .”
“I don’t believe it, Em. Not Neily and not Mason.”
I reached through the cell b
ars to take my brother’s hand. “I don’t want to believe it either, but don’t you see what this means? You’ll be exonerated.”
“Maybe . . . maybe not.”
“But once they have the real murderer—”
Brady shook his head. “That’s just it. Mason? Neily? Come on, Em. You know as well as I do that neither is capable of harming a fly. This will be just one more distraction to keep the police busy while the real murderer gets away. Maybe he’s already away. Might have left the island right after killing Jack on one of those fancy steamers the Four Hundred are so enamored of. No, Em, Jack’s death won’t help me at all. It only makes everything that much grimmer. . . .”
“It’s not like you to give up hope, Brady.” My voice trembled. Tears burned my eyes.
“Well, I didn’t so much give it up as run out of it, along with my luck.” He smiled bleakly, a gesture that had become so familiar I’d all but forgotten how brightly his genuine smile could shine. “And you have to admit, I’ve had more than my fair share of that. More than I deserve.”
I left the jail feeling so defeated I could hardly gather two words to say to Derrick as he walked me to my buggy. All I managed was a shaky, “Thank you,” before expecting to go our separate ways.
“I’ll follow you home.” He gestured to his own rented carriage parked behind my own.
“Oh, no. You’ve done enough. I’ll be fine.”
“I think not. Until this investigation ends with the guilty party behind bars, you’re not safe. I said I’m following you, and follow you I will.”
I couldn’t help a smile, albeit a weak one. “Thank you, Derrick. Thank you for believing me when I say my brother is innocent.”
“Yes, well, you seem to have a good nose when it comes to people. If you trust that he didn’t do it, that’s good enough for me.”
He smiled down at me, and for an instant I thought—half hoped—he might kiss me again. But the moment stretched too long, and I saw my own self-consciousness reflected in his eyes. He stepped back, offered me an arm, and helped me up into my buggy. As good as his word, he followed me all the way home, up the drive, and through the front door. But if I’d thought we might share a private moment before he left, I was greatly mistaken.
Murder at the Breakers Page 23
