The Penguin Book of Victorian Women in Crime

by Michael Sims

  “Fifth, who was seen to throw a bundle down the old well, in the rear of Martin Fairbanks’s house, at one o’clock in the morning?—Phœbe Dole.”

  “Was she—seen?” I gasped.

  Mr. Dix nodded. Then he wrote.

  “Sixth, who had a strong motive, which had been in existence many years ago?—Phœbe Dole.”

  Mr. Dix laid down his pen, and looked at me again.

  “Well, what have you to say?” he asked.

  “It is impossible!”

  “Why?”

  “She is a woman.”

  “A man could have fired that pistol, as she tried to do.”

  “It would have taken a man’s strength to kill with the kind of weapon that was used,” I said.

  “No, it would not. No great strength is required for such a blow.”

  “But she is a woman!”

  “Crime has no sex.”

  “But she is a good woman—a church member. I heard her pray yesterday afternoon. It is not in character.”

  “It is not for you, nor for me, nor for any mortal intelligence, to know what is or is not in character,” said Mr. Dix.

  He arose and went away. I could only stare at him in a half-dazed manner.

  Maria Woods came this afternoon, taking advantage of Phœbe’s absence on a dressmaking errand. Maria has aged ten years in the last few weeks. Her hair is white, her cheeks are fallen in, her pretty colour is gone.

  “May I have the ring he gave me forty years ago?” she faltered.

  I gave it to her; she kissed it and sobbed like a child. “Phœbe took it away from me before,” she said; “but she shan’t this time.”

  Maria related with piteous sobs the story of her long subordination to Phœbe Dole. This sweet child-like woman had always been completely under the sway of the other’s stronger nature. The subordination went back beyond my father’s original proposal to her; she had, before he made love to her as a girl, promised Phœbe she would not marry; and it was Phœbe who, by representing to her that she was bound by this solemn promise, had led her to write a letter to my father declining his offer, and sending back the ring.

  “And after all, we were going to get married, if he had not died,” she said. “He was going to give me this ring again, and he had had the other date put in. I should have been so happy!”

  She stopped and stared at me with horror-stricken enquiry.

  “What was Phœbe Dole doing in your backyard at one o’clock that night?” she cried.

  “What do you mean?” I returned.

  “I saw Phœbe come out of your back shed-door at one o’clock that very night. She had a bundle in her arms. She went along the path about as far as the old well, then she stooped down, and seemed to be working at something. When she got up she didn’t have the bundle. I was watching at our back-door. I thought I heard her go out a little while before, and went downstairs, and found that door unlocked. I went in quick, and up to my chamber, and into my bed, when she started home across the fields. Pretty soon I heard her come in, then I heard the pump going. She slept downstairs; she went on to her bedroom. What was she doing in your back-yard that night?”

  “You must ask her,” said I. I felt my blood running cold.

  “I’ve been afraid to,” moaned Maria Woods. “She’s been dreadful strange lately. I wish that book agent was going to stay at our house.”

  Maria Woods went home in about an hour. I got a ribbon for her, and she has my poor father’s ring concealed in her withered bosom. Again I cannot believe this.

  Thursday.—It is all over, Phœbe Dole has confessed! I do not know now in exactly what way Mr. Dix brought it about—how he accused her of her crime. After breakfast I saw them coming across the fields; Phœbe came first, advancing with rapid strides like a man, Mr. Dix followed, and my father’s poor old sweet-heart tottered behind, with her handkerchief at her eyes. Just as I noticed them the front-door bell rang; I found several people there, headed by the high sheriff. They crowded into the sitting-room just as Phœbe Dole came rushing in, with Mr. Dix and Maria Woods.

  “I did it!” Phœbe cried out to me. “I am found out, and I have made up my mind to confess. She was going to marry your father—I found it out. I stopped it once before. This time I knew I couldn’t unless I killed him. She’s lived with me in that house for over forty years. There are other ties as strong as the marriage one, that are just as sacred. What right had he to take her away from me and break up my home?

  “I overheard your father and Rufus Bennett having words. I thought folks would think he did it. I reasoned it all out. I had watched your cat go in that little door, I knew the shed door hooked, I knew how long my arm was; I thought I could undo it. I stole over here a little after midnight. I went all around the house to be sure nobody was awake. Out in the front yard I happened to think my shears were tied on my belt with a ribbon, and I untied them. I thought I put the ribbon in my pocket—it was a piece of yellow ribbon—but I suppose I didn’t, because they found it afterwards, and thought it came off your young man’s whip.

  “I went round to the shed-door, unhooked it, and went in. The moon gave light enough. I got out your father’s overalls from the kitchen closet; I knew where they were. I went through the sitting-room to the parlour. In there I slipped off my dress and skirts and put on the overalls. I put a handkerchief over my face, leaving only my eyes exposed. I crept out then into the sitting-room; there I pulled off my shoes and went into the bedroom.

  “Your father was fast asleep; it was such a hot night, the clothes were thrown back and his chest was bare. The first thing I saw was that pistol on the stand beside his bed. I suppose he had had some fear of Rufus Bennett coming back, after all. Suddenly I thought I’d better shoot him. It would be surer and quicker; and if you were aroused I knew that I could get away, and everybody would suppose that he had shot himself.

  “I took up the pistol and held it close to his head. I had never fired a pistol, but I knew how it was done. I pulled, but it would not go off. Your father stirred a little—I was mad with horror—I struck at his head with the pistol. He opened his eyes and cried out; then I dropped the pistol, and took these”—Phœbe Dole pointed to the great shining shears hanging at her waist—“for I am strong in my wrists. I only struck twice, over his heart.

  “Then I went back into the sitting-room. I thought I heard a noise in the kitchen—I was full of terror then—and slipped into the sitting-room closet. I felt as if I were fainting, and clutched the shelf to keep from falling.

  “I felt that I must go upstairs to see if you were asleep, to be sure you had not waked up when your father cried out. I thought if you had I should have to do the same by you. I crept upstairs to your chamber. You seemed sound asleep, but, as I watched, you stirred a little; but instead of striking at you I slipped into your closet. I heard nothing more from you. I felt myself wet with blood. I caught something hanging in your closet, and wiped myself over with it. I knew by the feeling it was your green silk. You kept quiet, and I saw you were asleep, so crept out of the closet, and down the stairs, got my clothes and shoes, and, out in the shed, took off the overalls and dressed myself. I rolled up the overalls, and took a board away from the old well and threw them in as I went home. I thought if they were found it would be no clue to me. The handkerchief, which was not much stained, I put to soak that night, and washed it out next morning, before Maria was up. I washed my hands and arms carefully that night, and also my shears.

  “I expected Rufus Bennett would be accused of the murder, and, maybe, hung. I was prepared for that, but I did not like to think I had thrown suspicion upon you by staining your dress. I had nothing against you. I made up my mind I’d get hold of that dress—before anybody suspected you—and dye it black. I came in and got it, as you know. I was astonished not to see any more stains on it. I only found two or three little streaks that scarcely anybody would have noticed. I didn’t know what to think. I suspected, of course, that you had found the stai
ns and got them off, thinking they might bring suspicion upon you.

  “I did not see how you could possibly suspect me in any case. I was glad when your young man was cleared. I had nothing against him. That is all I have to say.”

  I think I must have fainted away then. I cannot describe the dreadful calmness with which that woman told this—that woman with the good face, whom I had last heard praying like a saint in meeting. I believe in demoniacal possession after this.

  When I came to, the neighbours were around me, putting camphor on my head, and saying soothing things to me, and the old friendly faces had returned. But I wish I could forget!

  They have taken Phœbe Dole away—I only know that. I cannot bear to talk any more about it when I think there must be a trial, and I must go!

  Henry has been over this evening. I suppose we shall be happy after all, when I have had a little time to get over this. He says I have nothing more to worry about. Mr. Dix has gone home. I hope Henry and I may be able to repay his kindness some day.

  A month later: I have just heard that Phœbe Dole has died in prison. This is my last entry. May God help all other innocent women in hard straights as He has helped me!

  ANNA KATHARINE GREEN

  (1846-1935)

  Anna Katharine Green is one of the towering figures in the history of the detective story. Her primary detective, the tireless and sardonic Ebenezer Gryce of the New York City Police Department, is one of the great creations in the early days of the genre and deserves more attention than he usually receives nowadays. Green also created two female detectives—the highly amusing Amelia Butterworth, who appears in this chapter from her debut adventure, and a moody young socialite named Violet Strange, who appears later in this anthology.

  Some critics cite an 1866 dime novel entitled The Dead Letter, by Seeley Regester, whose real name was Metta Victoria Fuller Victor, as the first detective story by a woman. But Regester’s detective, Mr. Burton, often relies upon the psychic visions of his long-suffering daughter—whose gift he callously exploits despite the trances’ toll on her already poor health—and this paranormal element alone disqualifies the book for consideration as a legitimate detective novel. Regester also has a very loose conception of plot and depends heavily upon coincidence. From similarities in key elements, such as the male narrator’s romantic interest in one of the victim’s beautiful daughters, it seems likely that Green was influenced by Regester’s novel.

  However, when Green published her first book, The Leavenworth Case, in 1878, she greatly surpassed Regester in plot, characterization, wit, and sheer authorial style. She had worked on the novel for six years in secret before showing it to her father, the lawyer whose experiences helped inspire the book, and she was dumbfounded when it became a huge bestseller. This first case for Ebenezer Gryce even became required reading at Yale Law School, as an example of the dangers of circumstantial evidence. Green grew up in Brooklyn and Buffalo and set most of her three dozen books in New York City or elsewhere in the state.

  Not until 1897, two decades into her career, did Green introduce a second detective, Miss Amelia Butterworth, who herself narrates the three cases that she shares with Ebenezer Gryce. Butterworth’s courage and intelligence paved the way for female detectives from Miss Marple to Veronica Mars. Although two other novels about her followed this debut, the strongest in terms of both plot and character is the first, That Affair Next Door. Later in this book, when Butterworth first meets the famous police detective Ebenezer Gryce, he mistakenly concludes that she is merely a busybody. His mistake is in assuming “merely.” In time he develops great respect for her, and in subsequent adventures they evolve into something of an unofficial team.

  (For more about Anna Katharine Green, see the introduction

  to “The Second Bullet.”)

  THAT AFFAIR NEXT DOOR

  CHAPTER I

  A Discovery

  I am not an inquisitive woman, but when, in the middle of a certain warm night in September, I heard a carriage draw up at the adjoining house and stop, I could not resist the temptation of leaving my bed and taking a peep through the curtains of my window.

  First: because the house was empty, or supposed to be so, the family still being, as I had every reason to believe, in Europe; and secondly: because, not being inquisitive, I often miss in my lonely and single life much that it would be both interesting and profitable for me to know.

  Luckily I made no such mistake this evening. I rose and looked out, and though I was far from realizing it at the time, took, by so doing, my first step in a course of inquiry which has ended—

  But it is too soon to speak of the end. Rather let me tell you what I saw when I parted the curtains of my window in Gramercy Park, on the night of September 17, 1895.

  Not much at first glance, only a common hack drawn up at the neighboring curb-stone. The lamp which is supposed to light our part of the block is some rods away on the opposite side of the street, so that I obtained but a shadowy glimpse of a young man and woman standing below me on the pavement. I could see, however, that the woman—and not the man—was putting money into the driver’s hand. The next moment they were on the stoop of this long-closed house, and the coach rolled off.

  It was dark, as I have said, and I did not recognize the young people,—at least their figures were not familiar to me; but when, in another instant, I heard the click of a night-key, and saw them, after a rather tedious fumbling at the lock, disappear from the stoop, I took it for granted that the gentleman was Mr. Van Burnam’s eldest son Franklin, and the lady some relative of the family; though why this, its most punctilious member, should bring a guest at so late an hour into a house devoid of everything necessary to make the least exacting visitor comfortable, was a mystery that I retired to bed to meditate upon.

  I did not succeed in solving it, however, and after some ten minutes had elapsed, I was settling myself again to sleep when I was re-aroused by a fresh sound from the quarter mentioned. The door I had so lately heard shut, opened again, and though I had to rush for it, I succeeded in getting to my window in time to catch a glimpse of the departing figure of the young man hurrying away towards Broadway. The young woman was not with him, and as I realized that he had left her behind him in the great, empty house, without apparent light and certainly without any companion, I began to question if this was like Franklin Van Burnam. Was it not more in keeping with the recklessness of his more easy-natured and less reliable brother, Howard, who, some two or three years back, had married a young wife of no very satisfactory antecedents, and who, as I had heard, had been ostracized by the family in consequence?

  Whichever of the two it was, he had certainly shown but little consideration for his companion, and thus thinking, I fell off to sleep just as the clock struck the half hour after midnight.

  Next morning as soon as modesty would permit me to approach the window, I surveyed the neighboring house minutely. Not a blind was open, nor a shutter displaced. As I am an early riser, this did not disturb me at the time, but when after breakfast I looked again and still failed to detect any evidences of life in the great barren front beside me, I began to feel uneasy. But I did nothing till noon, when going into my rear garden and observing that the back windows of the Van Burnam house were as closely shuttered as the front, I became so anxious that I stopped the next policeman I saw going by, and telling him my suspicions, urged him to ring the bell.

  No answer followed the summons.

  “There is no one here,” said he.

  “Ring again!” I begged.

  And he rang again but with no better result.

  “Don’t you see that the house is shut up?” he grumbled. “We have had orders to watch the place, but none to take the watch off.”

  “There is a young woman inside,” I insisted. “The more I think over last night’s occurrence, the more I am convinced that the matter should be looked into.”

  He shrugged his shoulders and was moving away when we both obser
ved a common-looking woman standing in front looking at us. She had a bundle in her hand, and her face, unnaturally ruddy though it was, had a scared look which was all the more remarkable from the fact that it was one of those wooden-like countenances which under ordinary circumstances are capable of but little expression. She was not a stranger to me; that is, I had seen her before in or about the house in which we were at that moment so interested; and not stopping to put any curb on my excitement, I rushed down to the pavement and accosted her.

  “Who are you?” I asked. “Do you work for the Van Burnams, and do you know who the lady was who came here last night?”

  The poor woman, either startled by my sudden address or by my manner which may have been a little sharp, gave a quick bound backward, and was only deterred by the near presence of the policeman from attempting flight. As it was, she stood her ground, though the fiery flush, which made her face so noticeable, deepened till her cheeks and brow were scarlet.

  “I am the scrub-woman,” she protested. “I have come to open the windows and air the house,”—ignoring my last question.

  “Is the family coming home?” the policeman asked.

  “I don’t know; I think so,” was her weak reply.

  “Have you the keys?” I now demanded, seeing her fumbling in her pocket.

  She did not answer; a sly look displaced the anxious one she had hitherto displayed, and she turned away.

  “I don’t see what business it is of the neighbors,” she muttered, throwing me a dissatisfied scowl over her shoulder.

  “If you’ve got the keys, we will go in and see that things are all right,” said the policeman, stopping her with a light touch.

  She trembled; I saw that she trembled, and naturally became excited. Something was wrong in the Van Burnam mansion, and I was going to be present at its discovery. But her next words cut my hopes short.

  “I have no objection to your going in,” she said to the policeman, “but I will not give up my keys to her. What right has she in our house any way.” And I thought I heard her murmur something about a meddlesome old maid.