Murder on Pleasant Avenue

by Victoria Thompson

  “But why would they release her? Did someone pay a ransom?” Maeve asked.

  “Not that we know of,” Frank said.

  Gino grinned. “I think he was just terrified when he found out we were investigating and let her go.”

  Maeve gave him a dark look. “It couldn’t have been that.”

  “Whatever his reason, at least she’s safe,” Frank said.

  “Was she able to tell you anything?” Maeve asked.

  “She didn’t want to see anybody,” Gino said.

  “Not even Saint Teo?” Maeve taunted.

  “Not even Saint Teo,” Gino confirmed sadly.

  “But I telephoned Sarah and asked her to go see Miss Harding, so hopefully she’ll have better luck.”

  “If she knows anything at all, Mrs. Malloy will find out,” Maeve said.

  “Let’s hope she does. Petrosino could use all the help he can get with these kidnappings.”

  * * *

  * * *

  The maid arrived with lemonade just as Mrs. Prince made her startling prediction about Jane Harding, so Sarah had some time to consider it before responding. When the maid had gone, she said, “I should warn you that the note Miss Harding sent you is a request to come stay with you.”

  “Stay with us? Why on earth would she want to stay with us?”

  “I can’t speak for her of course, but you may be right that she doesn’t enjoy her volunteer work at the settlement house.” Good, that explained Jane’s desire to leave without mentioning the kidnapping. “Moving into your home is a respectable way for her to leave there without returning home to Saratoga Springs, which you indicated is probably the last thing she’d want to do.”

  Mrs. Prince obviously saw the logic of this, and she didn’t like it one bit. Before she could reply, however, the parlor door opened and a man stepped in. He was tall and attractive and probably not yet thirty, although he carried himself with a confidence that belied his youth.

  “I’m sorry to interrupt, darling, but I was told someone had brought a message about Jane.” He gave Sarah a polite and very formal smile. “Not bad news, I hope.”

  “That depends on what you consider bad news,” Lisa Prince replied with more than a hint of sarcasm. Mr. Prince’s eyebrows rose, but a man of his breeding would never betray family secrets in front of a stranger, so he merely waited for some more information. “Mrs. Malloy, this is my husband, Joseph Prince. Mrs. Malloy has brought me a note from Jane.” She held it up as proof.

  “You haven’t opened it,” he said, making it sound like a question.

  “Not yet, but Mrs. Malloy has warned me that Jane would like to come and stay with us for a time.”

  “Would she?” he asked, still trying not to give anything away, but he couldn’t conceal all of his true feelings. Plainly, he was not happy at this prospect.

  Sarah could certainly understand their reluctance, but she also knew that whatever Jane Harding may have done in the past, she really had endured a horrific ordeal and needed a sanctuary of some kind. “I’m afraid Miss Harding has found life at the settlement house more difficult than she anticipated,” Sarah said, hoping she could convince them without giving away too much. “She desperately needs some time away, and you would be doing her a great kindness to let her visit you.”

  Sarah could see her plea had touched their sense of duty if not their sense of pity, but they still weren’t quite convinced.

  “What does she say in the note?” Prince asked, coming over to where his wife sat on the sofa and taking a seat beside her.

  With a sigh, Mrs. Prince tore open the envelope and read the brief missive. “She says the work at the settlement house has disturbed her far more than she could have imagined and she begs me to let her come and stay with us for a week or two until she decides what course she should take.”

  “The course she should take is back to Saratoga Springs,” Prince said, no longer bothering to hide his anger.

  “Of course it is,” his wife said. “But once her parents get her home, she’ll never be allowed to come to the city again.”

  “So she wants to come here and plant herself so she can enjoy the delights of New York without censure and at no cost to her or her parents.”

  “You may be judging her too harshly,” Sarah felt compelled to say. “As Mrs. Prince pointed out to me, you know her far better than I, but I saw her today, and I know how distressed she is. I think she would be very grateful for your assistance, and you are under no obligation to keep her more than a few days. You can always ask her parents to come and take her home if she proves troublesome.”

  Mrs. Prince sighed again. “I would never forgive myself if Jane really needed help and I refused to give it.”

  “And I will never forgive you if you allow her to abuse you in your own house,” Prince said with a loving smile to soften his words. “So it’s settled. We’ll take her but only on sufferance.”

  “We have an engagement tonight, though,” Mrs. Prince recalled with dismay.

  “She isn’t expecting a response until tomorrow at the earliest,” Sarah said. “She actually asked me to mail the note, but I was passing here on my way home so I thought I’d make sure you received it promptly.”

  This was obviously a relief to Mrs. Prince. “We’ll send the carriage for her tomorrow, then, and I suppose I should go myself to fetch her.”

  “I know Miss Harding will appreciate your generosity,” Sarah said, thinking she was probably telling the truth. Miss Harding might be jealous of her cousin’s lot in life, but she would also be grateful to escape her current situation for one not only more secure but also much more luxurious.

  “I’m sorry you became involved in our little family dramas, Mrs. Malloy,” Mrs. Prince said. “And I appreciate your kindness to Jane.”

  “I have a family of my own, so I know how difficult things can be.” And they could be much more difficult than this, as Sarah knew only too well. At least no one in this family had died. Jane Harding would probably recover from her ordeal, and one hoped she would show the proper amount of gratitude to her cousin.

  Sarah didn’t have to worry about any of that, though. Her part in this family drama was now over.

  * * *

  * * *

  Gino left the motorcar at the curb outside the settlement house and went in, looking for Mrs. Malloy. Late-afternoon classes were letting out, so he had to step aside in the foyer to make way for those exiting the building. He found Teo tidying up one of the classrooms.

  “You’re back,” she said.

  “Yeah, Mr. Malloy suggested I drive up here to see if Mrs. Malloy is ready to go home yet.”

  “She already left, I’m afraid, but if you don’t have anything else to do, why don’t you stay and have supper with me and Rinaldo tonight. Unless you need to get the motorcar back or something.”

  “No, I don’t. Mr. Malloy doesn’t even know how to drive it, and I’d love to see Rinaldo.”

  When Teo had finished her duties, Gino drove her the six blocks to the tenement where she and Rinaldo lived. Gino drove slowly and carefully, since it was Teo’s first time in a motor and he didn’t want her to be frightened. Also because she wanted to be sure all of her neighbors had a chance to see her in it.

  Rinaldo came home a little later. Everyone said all the Donatelli boys looked alike, but Gino had always thought Rinaldo was the handsomest of the six. He was also the smartest. He’d married Teo, hadn’t he? He and Gino sat on the front stoop drinking wine and telling each other lies in between showing neighbors the motorcar until Teo called them in for supper. As Gino had said, Teo didn’t need anyone to teach her how to cook. The meal was delicious, and afterward they all went outside again to catch what breeze they could as the sun sank and the city cooled down a bit. Teo joined a group of women gathered on a neighboring stoop while more men joine
d Rinaldo and Gino on theirs. Gino kept them entertained with tales of the crimes he and Mr. Malloy had investigated, until the sky had darkened completely and people started heading inside for bed.

  “I guess I should be going,” Gino said, rising from his place on the stoop. Teo had just left the group of ladies, who all appeared to be going inside as well.

  “Gino, wait,” she called. By the time she reached him and Rinaldo, the other men had gone. “I heard something you should know.”

  “Gossip,” Rinaldo teased, giving Gino a wink. “The women know everything.”

  “Mama usually does,” Gino reminded his brother.

  “And so do I,” Teo said unrepentantly. She glanced around to make sure no one else was near and lowered her voice. “It seems Nunzio Esposito has a new flat in the tenement they just built on Pleasant Avenue.”

  “But he already has a house,” Rinaldo said.

  Teo nodded sagely. “Where his wife lives. They say the new flat is to keep his other woman.”

  A dozen possibilities flashed through Gino’s mind, but one seemed more likely than all the others. “Was this woman there of her own free will?”

  “No one knows, but someone did see a woman there. She had yellow hair.”

  “Which would make her unusual in this neighborhood,” Rinaldo said.

  “And Jane Harding has yellow hair. Where exactly is this flat?” Gino asked.

  * * *

  * * *

  So Miss Harding will be taken care of,” Sarah concluded after telling Frank how she had spent her afternoon.

  Frank wasn’t so sure, but maybe Miss Harding didn’t need as much care as they had originally assumed. When he’d come home from his office and found Sarah in the parlor, he’d been surprised to learn she had missed Gino and had created an errand for herself on her way home. “You didn’t need to personally deliver that note, you know.”

  “Of course I didn’t, but you can’t think I’d pass up an opportunity to help out if I could, can you?”

  “Or to get a look at the Princes,” he added with a grin. “I’m sure they were grateful for your interference.”

  “I doubt it, but at least I was able to convince them to give Miss Harding a place to stay. I had the impression that Jane had hurt Mrs. Prince very much, so Miss Harding may not have been at all welcome there if I hadn’t gone in person to convince them. So what are you going to do now?”

  “We’ll have to tell Gino what you learned from Miss Harding, but I’m thinking there isn’t much more we can do if she doesn’t have any idea who kidnapped her or exactly where she was held. I’ll tell Petrosino what she said, just in case it helps him with any of his cases, but with Miss Harding home safe, I think our work is done.”

  After supper, Sarah helped Maeve tuck Brian and Catherine into bed and then the two women joined Frank and his mother in the parlor. Mother Malloy had her own quarters in the large house, but she preferred to join them in the evening. Sarah filled Maeve in on what she’d learned from Miss Harding and what she’d learned about her from Lisa Prince.

  “That sounds odd,” Maeve said when Sarah had finished.

  “Which part?” Sarah asked with a smile.

  “Well, all of it,” Maeve said. “But if she’s so upset that she has to leave the settlement house, why doesn’t she just go home?”

  “And why would she go someplace she isn’t welcome?” Frank’s mother remarked, not even looking up from her knitting. Sarah held that it was too hot to knit in the summer, but that never seemed to bother his mother.

  “I wondered that myself, Mother Malloy,” Sarah said. “We think—that is, Mrs. Prince and I think—that Miss Harding wants to stay in the city, even though she’s not eager to work at the settlement house.”

  “I can’t blame her for that,” Maeve said.

  Frank couldn’t either, but . . . “Even after she was kidnapped?”

  “Doesn’t sound like she suffered too much,” his mother said. “A respectable girl would be scared out of her wits.”

  “Was Miss Harding scared out of her wits?” Frank asked his wife.

  “She had been crying, but . . .”

  “But what?” Maeve asked too eagerly.

  “But she didn’t seem as upset as I expected, and she didn’t want anyone to comfort her either.”

  “Not that it matters,” his mother reminded them. “You’re done with her now, aren’t you?”

  They were of course, and Sarah deftly changed the subject to more pleasant topics for the rest of the evening. Maeve and his mother had already gone up to bed when the doorbell rang.

  “Who could that be at this hour?” Sarah wondered.

  Frank got up to answer it. “I’d guess it’s Gino returning the motor. He was probably giving everybody in East Harlem a ride around the block.”

  Sure enough, Gino was on the front steps. “I’m sorry it’s so late, but they told me at the settlement house that Mrs. Malloy had already gone home, so Teo invited me to supper and . . .”

  “And naturally, you stayed. You want to come in?”

  “No, it’s late. I just wanted you to know I brought the motor back. I also thought you’d like to know that the women in East Harlem are gossiping about Nunzio Esposito.”

  “And what are they saying about him?”

  “That he’s set up an apartment on Pleasant Avenue for some woman who isn’t his wife.”

  “Who is the woman?”

  “Nobody knows, but they say she has yellow hair.”

  Frank’s mind was racing, but Sarah had overheard them and come to the door, too.

  “Do you suppose he intended to kidnap Jane and keep her there as his mistress?” she asked.

  “I wouldn’t put it past him,” Gino said. “A man like that . . .”

  “But then, why did he let her go?” Frank asked.

  “Because you were looking for her,” Sarah suggested. “He didn’t want a scandal.”

  “Do you think a man like that would be worried about a scandal?” Frank asked.

  “And would he really think he could keep it a secret, in any case?” Gino asked. “In that neighborhood?”

  “Who knows what he thought,” Frank said, “but that at least explains why he knew Miss Harding was safe. He’d released her himself.”

  “Anyway, I thought you’d want to know.”

  They thanked Gino and bid him good night.

  “Good heavens, what a horrible man,” Sarah said.

  “If it’s true. Maybe the Black Hand just decided they needed a closer place to keep their kidnap victims. You know how gossip can get things twisted.”

  “I hope that’s all it is. We’ll probably never know.”

  * * *

  * * *

  This was foolish. And reckless. Mr. Malloy would tell him that and talk him out of doing it, but then Nunzio Esposito would get away again, just like he’d been getting away with everything all of his life. Gino couldn’t let that happen, not if he could stop it. Not if he could do something to keep women and children from being kidnapped—Italian women and children mostly. Instead of Mrs. Cassidi, it might’ve been Gino’s own mother. Or Teo. He’d joined the police force because he wanted to help the Italians, who were his people, because nobody else seemed to care about them. When he’d realized the police weren’t going to be the solution, he’d partnered with Mr. Malloy so they could get justice when no one else could. Or would.

  He’d lain awake most of the night thinking about all this, which was why he was in East Harlem this morning. He’d taken the elevated train up from the other Little Italy, crammed in with all those going to their jobs, because he wanted to get an early start. Not that he expected Esposito to be up and around at this hour, but Mr. Malloy had taught him that catching a man when he wasn’t quite awake gave you an advantage.

&
nbsp; Too bad he didn’t know where Esposito lived. He could probably find out, though. He banged on the door of Esposito’s saloon until somebody finally came to answer. The man had obviously been awakened by Gino’s insistent pounding. He wore an undershirt and was still adjusting his suspenders, probably because he’d just pulled on his pants. His unshaven face scowled at Gino through the glass, which rattled when he yanked the door open.

  “What do you want?” At least it wasn’t Balducci, who was already pretty angry at Gino and Mr. Malloy for leaving him standing on the sidewalk when they drove away to see Esposito.

  “I need to see Esposito.”

  “You won’t see him here, not until tonight.”

  “It’s an emergency,” Gino tried. He glanced around as if checking for eavesdroppers, then leaned in and lowered his voice. “It’s about the woman.”

  “What woman?” the man asked, but Gino could see he was bluffing. His eyes had widened just a bit and suddenly his manner wasn’t quite so confident.

  “You know what woman. I need to find Esposito.”

  “Did you try his house?” the man asked. This time he was the one who glanced around nervously.

  Gino scowled the way he’d seen Mr. Malloy do it when he doubted someone’s honesty. “Do you think he’s at his house?”

  The man chewed his lip for a long moment while Gino waited patiently for him to fill the silence. “Try the flat.”

  “Where is it? I know it’s on Pleasant Avenue, but . . .” He gestured helplessly. Teo hadn’t known the exact address.

  The man needed a little more convincing, but he finally gave Gino the address and the apartment number. “But don’t tell him I told you.”

  “I’m not going to tell him anything except what I know about the woman.” Gino strode away with an air of confidence he didn’t feel. The man wouldn’t know that, so maybe he wouldn’t tell anyone that Gino had been looking for Esposito. Not that it would matter. Gino would be in as much trouble as he could be in when he found the Black Hand leader.