Victoria Thompson: Murder on Washington Square

Oops, she’d been caught in a lie, but Sarah wasn’t going to squirm. “At the hospital. He asked me to stop by whenever I had a chance,” Sarah lied again. “I would have been here sooner, but I’ve been very busy with my work.”

“Your work, ” the old woman scoffed. “A woman should be home caring for her own babies, not out at all hours with someone else’s.”

Her careless words had touched a raw nerve, but Sarah only winced inwardly. “Do you know when the cast will come off?” she asked to change the subject.

Mrs. Malloy glanced down at Brian, as if she’d almost forgotten he was there. He was terribly quiet, and Sarah saw to her surprise that he’d taken a toy horse and attached it to the front of the trolley with some string. The horse was now pulling the trolley, just the way horses pulled the ones that hadn’t been electrified yet in the streets outside. Once again she marveled at how clever he was. If only he could speak and understand. If only he weren’t deaf.

“It’ll come off in a couple more weeks, Francis says,” Mrs. Malloy replied to her question about Brian’s cast. “Then we’ll know if all this cutting did the poor boy any good.”

She didn’t sound like she was holding out any hope. That would be her way of protecting herself, of course. Don’t hope for anything good, and you’ll never be disappointed. Or don’t give the Devil a chance to crush your hopes. Or don’t tempt the fates. Whatever her reason, she’d never be optimistic about anything, least of all a loved one.

Sarah decided not to offer encouragement that the old woman didn’t want. Instead she slid off her chair and knelt on the floor so Brian could better show her his handiwork.

Sarah was just beginning to think about what to have for lunch the next day when someone began pounding on her back door. Hardly anyone except Mrs. Ellsworth ever came to her back door, which opened into the small yard behind her row house, and her neighbor wouldn’t be pounding like that unless something was terribly wrong. Sarah hurried to see who was there and opened the door to a distraught Mrs. Ellsworth.

“Oh, Mrs. Brandt, thank heaven you’re home!” she cried, flinging herself into Sarah’s arms. Her face was pale, and she was trembling.

“What is it?” Sarah asked in alarm. “Has someone attacked you?”

“Oh, no, I-”

“Is someone in your house? Should I get help?”

“No, I-”

“Here, sit down, you’re all wet,” Sarah said, forcing her into one of the kitchen chairs. It had been raining off and on all morning, and Mrs. Ellsworth had crossed over from her own yard without even an umbrella. Or a cloak, for that matter. And she still wore her house dress and apron. Something was terribly wrong. “Is it Nelson? Is he sick?”

“No, it’s-”

“Are you sick then?”

“No!” she almost shouted. “And if you’ll be still for a minute, I’ll tell you what did happen!”

Chastened, Sarah pulled a towel from the peg by the sink and handed it to her before taking another of the kitchen chairs. “Go ahead.”

“A man came to my door just now. Says he’s a reporter.”

“A newspaper reporter?” Now Sarah was confused. Why would a newspaper reporter have come to Mrs. Ellsworth’s door? Being a very fount of neighborhood gossip would hardly make her a good source for news. “What did he want?”

“He wants to know about Nelson. He said Nelson has been arrested!”

“Arrested! Whatever for?”

“For… for murder!” Mrs. Ellsworth’s voice shook on the word.

“There must be some mistake,” Sarah exclaimed, picturing meek and mild Nelson Ellsworth in her mind. Murder was a crime of passion, and Nelson didn’t have a passionate bone in his body. And then she remembered Nelson’s secret liaison with Anna Blake and realized she was wrong. Nelson did have at least a spark of passion. “Who… whom is he supposed to have killed?” she asked, afraid she already knew.

“Some woman. They found her in the Square, Washington Square, this morning. They said Nelson was her lover! Can you imagine? How could anyone make such a terrible mistake?”

Sarah wasn’t about to answer that question. “Where is the reporter now?”

“Still standing on my doorstep, I imagine, unless he went on his way. I slammed the door in his face and came right over here.”

“Stay right where you are,” Sarah said, patting Mrs. Ellsworth’s frail hand reassuringly. “I’ll see what I can find out from him.”

She hurried through her house, out to the office. When she opened the front door, she saw the rain had let up to a light drizzle. Indeed, a man was standing on the Ellsworths’ front stoop. He’d turned up his collar and pulled his hat low over his eyes to protect himself from the rain, so Sarah couldn’t tell very much about him from here.

“Sir!” she called to get his attention.

He’d been looking up, as if considering how he might scale the wall and gain entrance to the Ellsworth house through one of the windows above. He turned to Sarah.

“Are you the reporter?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am,” he said. “Do you know Nelson Ellsworth? I’d like to ask you a few questions-”

“I’d like to ask you a few questions, too,” Sarah said. “Could you come over here?”

He hurried down the porch steps and through the drizzle to Sarah’s door. “I’m Webster Prescott with The World, ” he said, naming one of the several newspapers published in the city. He showed her a dog-eared card identifying him as a reporter.

“Please come in, Mr. Prescott,” she said, admitting him to the house and closing the door behind them.

Now she could see that he was very young, hardly more than twenty. Tall and gangly under his cheap, damp suit, he didn’t seem quite sure what to do with his hands and feet.

He looked around curiously. “What is this, some kind of doctor’s office?”

Sarah didn’t feel obligated to explain. “I’m a midwife,” she said.

He removed his hat, being careful not to let it drip too much on Sarah’s floor. She took it from him gingerly and hung it by the door. His hair was light brown and a little curly around the edges, giving him an even greater illusion of youth. If he’d been a police officer, Malloy would have called him a “Goo Goo.” She wondered what baby newspaper reporters were called.

“Please come in and tell me what this is all about,” she said, ushering him to the desk where she interviewed patients. She motioned for him to take a seat in the visitor’s chair while she sat behind the desk.

He’d pulled a small notebook and pencil from his inside pocket. “How long have you known Nelson Ellsworth?” he asked, poised to scribble her reply in his notebook and looking up at her expectantly with his pale blue eyes.

“I think you need to answer a few questions for me first,” she said. “What’s this about a murder?”

He registered surprise, then glanced around as if to make sure they were alone. “How did you know about the murder?”

“That hardly matters. Who was murdered?”

Mr. Prescott consulted his notebook. “A woman named Anna Blake,” he said, and Sarah was hard pressed not to groan aloud. This was just what she had feared. “They found her stabbed to death in Washington Square Park this morning, early. Right under the hanging tree. You know where I mean?”

Sarah felt a cold chill. She knew only too well. She’d just been there two days ago with Nelson Ellsworth. “If she was killed in the Square at night, anyone could have done it,” Sarah pointed out. “A woman alone after dark could have been the victim of a robber or worse. Have you thought of that?”