by Rhys Bowen
“So whose decision was it to have her locked away up here?” I asked.
“After it happened her mother was fearful for her little boy and for the one she was expecting. She didn’t want Kathleen in the same house anymore. So it was agreed she’d be put in an institution for the mentally impaired. They found one in the Connecticut countryside and off she was shipped. It was agreed that she’d never be mentioned again.”
“That’s terrible—a four-year-old child condemned because she was jealous of her popular twin and did something stupid on impulse.”
She shrugged. “You have to understand how they all adored Colleen. Miss Irene and Mr. Archie doted on her. And so did the master. She was the light of his life. But he was a fair man, a just man. Miss Irene couldn’t bring herself to visit her daughter, in fact a doctor told her that it would be more disturbing for the child to see her family. But Alderman Hannan, he went up to see her, and he was horrified. This place was supposed to be a humane institution and they were paying well for the privilege of keeping her there, but he said the patients were treated like animals. They were like animals—unkempt, crawling around on the floor, stealing each other’s food. He saw Kathleen retreating further and further into herself, giving up on life. He knew if he left her there any longer she’d die. So he had these rooms built secretly within the tower. He made them soundproof and a stair going up within the walls. I’m the only one who has the key and knows the way in.”
She paused, breathing heavily, and she toyed with the knife in her hand. For a moment I wondered if she was still considering using it on me and I glanced around for something to defend myself with.
“Didn’t her parents ever want to check on her?” I asked after a silence.
“They believed that the alderman visited her regularly—which he did, of course—and reported back to them. But if you ask me, I think they preferred not to be reminded of her.”
“How do you manage to keep her a secret?” I asked.
“Most of the year it’s no problem,” she said. “It’s only me and Kathleen and she’s been an easy child until recently.”
“What happens when the family is here?”
“Then I change her routine,” she said. “I give her medicine to make her sleep all day and then she’s up at night.”
“No wonder you wanted to get back when you came to Daniel the other night,” I said.
“I don’t like to leave her too long when people are here.” She glanced at the door. “I’ve had to put the fear of God into the child. I’ve told her that the bad people will take her away back to that dreadful place if they find her here, so she has to be as quiet as a little mouse. I hate doing it, but it’s for her own good. Poor little mite looks down from her window and doesn’t even know it’s her own brothers running around down there.”
“They saw her the other night,” I said.
She sighed. “I feared it would happen eventually. Usually it’s no problem because they bring their own staff with them all summer and I can watch over Kathleen, but this visit—well, it’s completely thrown me. Even before the master’s death I felt that something bad was about to happen to us.”
I didn’t quite know what to say. She still had the knife in her hand. She seemed to be considering things too because she said, “You don’t think, do you…?”
“That she had anything to do with his death?” I shook my head. “If he’d just been pushed off the cliff then I’d consider the possibility, although I doubt that she’s strong enough. She’s small for her age, isn’t she?”
She nodded.
“But I can’t believe that a child of limited mental abilities, who doesn’t even communicate, could plan a murder that involved putting poison in a glass of whiskey. How would she know that her grandfather drank whiskey? Can she even read? I don’t see any books. How would she know where poison was kept or even what it did?”
“My thoughts too,” Mrs. McCreedy said, “but that’s not how they will look at it. When they find out she’s here, she’ll be the one they want to pin it on, you mark my words. Because if it wasn’t her, then likely it was one of them and that’s too worrying to think about.”
“Maybe the police will soon find out who really killed him and then she’ll be safe,” I said.
“Maybe not.” She turned the knife over in her hand. “I don’t know what to do, Mrs. Sullivan. You’re a nice enough woman, I daresay, but I don’t see how I can let you go.”
I realized then that she had been pushed to the verge of madness. I had to tread most carefully. “I told my husband about finding a way up through the ivy into the tower,” I said. “He knows I’m here. Besides, I can tell you’re a good Catholic woman. You couldn’t kill someone and then live with yourself. Added to which I’m a trained detective. I know how to defend myself pretty well.”
She threw the knife down on the table. “Then help me,” she said, “because I don’t know what to do. You don’t know what she was like when she came here. A terrified little animal, that’s what she was. Crawling around on all fours and scurrying off to hide under furniture if I came near her.”
“I realize that it’s a problem,” I said. “And I’d like to help her if I could.”
“Then go away, go back to New York City with your new husband, and forget about us. Say nothing and she’ll be safe.”
“Look, I’ll do what I can,” I said. “I also have to remember that I’m married to a police officer. I’ll have to share this knowledge with him and he may feel that we have to report her presence to the Newport police.”
“Then the family will know and it will be all over.” Tears were now running down her fat cheeks. “He wanted to protect her. He made sure the family never found out she was here. I’d be letting him down as well as her.”
Tentatively I touched her arm. “I will try to do all I can to protect her, I promise.”
“Yes.” She wiped tears away with the back of her hand. “And we can pray, can’t we? We can pray that there is justice for the late master and for this little mite too.”
* * *
Kathleen was playing with her dollhouse as we came out of the kitchen area. She didn’t look up, instead went on singing nonsense in a sweet, high voice. “Na baba do, Coween.”
I squatted down beside the girl. “You have a nice dollhouse, Kathleen,” I said. “Are the dolls having their tea?”
She looked up at me with a puzzled expression then went back to her tuneless humming, moving the furniture around and ignoring me.
“You should go,” Mrs. McCreedy said, pulling me to my feet. She half pushed me to the door.
“Did she ever speak normally?” I asked.
“I hardly saw her before the—the tragedy,” she said. “They came with their nanny and were mostly up in the nursery. But I remember she and her sister were very thick, whispering and hugging together, but from what I hear she was quite normal in most ways.”
“Do you understand her? Does she use real words?”
She looked back at the girl on the floor. “Sometimes I think I understand her—at least some words—but then others it’s total gibberish.”
A sudden thought struck me. “I have a friend in New York who is an alienist—a doctor of the mind. He studied in Vienna with Professor Freud who is discovering such interesting things about dreams. Would you like him to take a look at her? Maybe he’d be able to unlock the mind she has shut from the outside world.”
Her eyes darted nervously. “I don’t know about that. The last doctor condemned her to the asylum. Why wouldn’t this one do the same?”
“He’s an intelligent, compassionate man. I believe he might be able to help her. Wouldn’t you like her restored to normality?”
She shook her head violently at this. “No, I would not. As long as she didn’t know what she was doing, then it would only be some kind of asylum for her. If she was proved to be sane, well then it could well be jail, couldn’t it?”
“Surely not, at her ag
e. Even if she knew what she was doing, a four-year-old has no real concept of death, of killing someone. It was an impulse and you can see what it has done to her.”
“Whatever it is, it won’t be for the better, poor little mite.” She unlocked the door and led me down the stairs. I stepped aside and allowed her to go first. To tell you the truth, I thought she might be tempted to give me a shove and get rid of me in what would look like an accident. I could see her point. She had protected the child for eight years and now all her hard work was about to be undone. When we reached the window she stopped.
“If you don’t mind, I’d like you going back the way you came,” she said. “I’d rather you didn’t discover the way out of here. If you honestly don’t know how to get in and out, then you can’t give us away by mistake, can you?”
She stood watching as I hitched up my skirts and eased myself out of that window.
“Now I’m making sure it’s good and secure,” she said after me. “You’ll not be getting in this way again, no more will she be getting out. I’ll be making sure she takes her medicine to make her sleep until everyone has gone.”
I heard the window slam shut behind me and climbed down, getting a couple of good scratches along the way.
Twenty-seven
At last I was on the ground and went back to the cottage without encountering anyone. Martha had just arrived and was humming to herself in the kitchen.
“Lovely morning, Mrs. Sullivan,” she called. “Been out for an early walk have you?”
“That’s right,” I said, hoping she wouldn’t notice that I was barefoot and surely had bits of ivy sticking out of my hair. “I’m going to take a bath before breakfast. Is Captain Sullivan awake yet?”
“Not when I peeked in,” she said.
I went up to see for myself and found him still sleeping peacefully. Then I made a decision. Daniel would undoubtedly tell me that I had to inform the police about Kathleen. I didn’t like the idea of keeping things from him, but I saw all too clearly that she would make a perfect scapegoat—a crazy child who has already killed once. How perfect. Case closed. I needed to buy myself some time. And to seek advice for once. I had never been too good about asking for help or seeking advice, but this time there was too much at stake and friends, whose opinion I valued, were within reach.
I wasn’t going to wait for Sid and Gus to wake up, then have their usual leisurely breakfast before they came to visit. I made myself look respectable, put on shoes and stockings and then told Martha I was going to pay a call on the next door neighbors. As I walked I smiled at the term. Next door neighbors—Irish castle to Roman marble palace. You’d hardly pop next door for a cup of sugar in these parts!
As I came out of the gate and turned into the road I glanced at the colonial house across the street and saw those lace curtains drop back into place. Even at this hour the occupant was either vigilant or nosy, depending on how one saw it. I resolved to pay her a call on my way home.
The Roman marble palace next door had even grander gates than the Hannan residence. These were gilt tipped with tall classical statues on either side. Luckily there was a little door to one side. It opened easily and I let myself into magnificent formal gardens and a broad driveway leading to the white columns at the front of the house. It was breathtakingly beautiful although personally I’d not have liked to live in a place that looked like a mausoleum. I went up the marble steps and rang the doorbell.
The woman who answered looked most surprised to see me. “Miss Augusta and Miss Elena are in residence, madam,” she said, “but they are not ready to receive visitors at this hour. They haven’t even come down to breakfast yet.”
“Don’t worry, they are used to my dropping in on them at strange hours,” I said. “I am their next door neighbor back in New York and we often take breakfast together. If you could just let them know I am here and it’s rather urgent.”
“If you say so, ma’am. Whom should I say is calling?” She said displaying considerable reluctance.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t bring my card with me.” I said it half joking, but she nodded as if she was accepting my apology just this once. “But it’s Mrs. Daniel Sullivan.”
“If you’ll please come in and take a seat,” she said, ushering me into a circular marble hallway with statues in niches and a curved marble stair ascending to a marble balcony above. She indicated an uncomfortable-looking marble bench. I sat.
It was cold and drafty in that marble hall and I found myself wondering about the rich and why they would want homes that were neither comfortable nor friendly. The sound of the housekeeper’s feet on the marble steps made me look up. Her demeanor had changed.
“Mrs. Sullivan,” she said. “Miss Augusta and Miss Elena would be delighted to join you in the breakfast room as soon as they have completed their toilettes. Please follow me.” And she led me to a delightful room with large arched windows giving incredible views onto the ocean. Sun streamed in and there was the smell of coffee and bacon. A row of silver tureens sat on a white-clothed sideboard along one wall—an awful lot of tureens for two people, I thought.
“Do help yourself,” she said. “I’m afraid the choice is a little sparse today, but I wasn’t given much warning of Miss Augusta’s arrival, and frankly one doesn’t expect family visits at this time of year.”
I took a plate and opened the first tureen to reveal scrambled eggs, then bacon, sausages, smoked haddock … I felt the housekeeper’s presence looming behind me and couldn’t decide whether she was making sure I had everything I needed or she was worried that I’d walk off with the silver.
I turned to her. “Have you been with the family long, Mrs.—?”
“Sweeney, ma’am. Mrs. Sweeney. And yes, I’ve been housekeeper here since the family first built the home in ’88.”
“I’m staying with the family next door,” I said. “The Hannans.”
She pursed her lips. “Are you, ma’am? They’ve been saying Mr. Hannan was killed, is that right?”
“That’s correct. He fell from the cliff. Very tragic.”
“I’m sorry to hear that, ma’am. My condolences if you were a friend of his.”
I smiled. “I take it the family here is not great friends with their neighbors?”
“Begging your pardon, ma’am, but you can’t just make a lot of money and then expect to fit in with families who have been brought up to wealth. That’s not just how it works. Mr. Hannan might have been rich, but he’d never have belonged here in Newport. He was never invited to the parties, you know. Mrs. Astor wouldn’t even acknowledge him in the street.” She paused. “I’m sorry, I should never have spoken my mind, you being a friend and all.”
“Actually I never met Mr. Hannan. My husband has had business connections, that’s all.”
“Ah, well in that case, you’ll understand why I feel the way I do. God rest the poor gentleman’s soul. It must be a shock for the rest of the family, although what they are doing here in October is past me. Whoever heard of one of the cottages being occupied after Labor Day? See what I was saying about good manners and fitting in? You can’t buy breeding.”
I took my plate to a place at the table and poured myself coffee. Mrs. Sweeney didn’t offer to pour for me and I tried to remember if it was usual for the rich to serve themselves at breakfast. Footsteps on the marble floor outside announced the arrival of Sid and Gus. Gus came toward me, arms open.
“Molly, dear. How nice of you to come and share breakfast with us. How is dear Daniel?”
“I left him sleeping peacefully,” I said. “And I didn’t just come to visit to be social. There is something urgent I wish to discuss with you.”
“Let us just help ourselves to coffee and then fire away,” Sid said. I noticed she poured her own coffee, then lifted one tureen after another, closing each with a shudder.
“Just toast, I think,” she said. “You don’t perhaps have any croissants, do you, Mrs. Sweeney?”
“We do not, I’m afra
id.” Mrs. Sweeney’s expression made it quite clear that she hadn’t a clue what croissants were and that she would never serve them if she did know.
Sid took a slice of toast and sat down beside me.
“What did you want to discuss, Molly? You’re looking worried.”
“Let’s wait for Gus,” I said. I turned to Mrs. Sweeney. “Tell me, Mrs. Sweeney, I presume you heard about Mr. Hannan’s grandchild who fell from the cliff about eight years ago?”
“We did hear something about it,” she said. “Such a shame. Sweet little thing, I remember.”
“Did you ever meet her sister?”
“Sister? There was more than one child?”
“She had a twin.”
“Ah, that explains it then. I saw her a few times and once she was smiley and friendly and then the next time she was silent and shrank behind her nurse. So they were twins. How interesting.”
“But you never heard the details of her death?”
“No, I can’t say that I did. As I said, this household was not on social terms with the Hannan family.” She looked around as Gus sat on the other side of the table. “Is there anything else I can get you, Miss Augusta.”
“No, thank you, Mrs. Sweeney. This all looks splendid,” Gus said.
The housekeeper gave a little half-bow, half-nod and went.
Gus gave me an exasperated look. “We did tell her that we don’t like a big breakfast, but I don’t think it sank in. Now, what is so important that it needs to be discussed at this ungodly hour, Molly?”
I told them exactly what had happened to me—the white figure in the night, my climb to the tower, and what I had discovered there.
“How frightfully thrilling,” Sid said. “A hidden child who murdered her twin. How terribly gothic.”
