He looked wary. “What would that achieve? Do you want her to be burdened with the knowledge of what she did? Isn’t it kinder to leave her in oblivion?”
“Chief Prescott.” I put down the painting and turned to face him. “Do you want this case solved or not? I don’t believe this child is responsible for anything that has happened here.”
“How can you go on insisting that? What about the housekeeper?”
“I don’t think she killed the housekeeper or her twin. I’d like one chance to prove her innocence—that’s all I’m asking.”
“What do you plan to do, Mrs. Sullivan?” he asked warily.
I told him and he listened, frowning.
“Most irregular,” he said, “and I can’t see what you could hope to achieve.”
“What harm could it do?” I said.
“What harm? What about the harm to the child? What if the shock is too much for her and pushes her into madness for life?”
I nodded. “I have considered that. I know we’d be taking an awful risk but I see no other way to save her. If nothing is achieved then the poor child will spend the rest of her life locked away, shut off from love and affection, among the mad. I’ll do anything in my power to prevent that from happening. If you’re a just man, you would not want another horrible miscarriage of justice, would you? If it was your daughter, would you want her locked away in a madhouse?”
“No, of course not,” he spluttered. “But then my daughter has not been in a catatonic state for eight years.”
“Maybe your daughter did not witness a shocking crime to the one she loved best. Ten minutes, Chief Prescott. That’s all I ask.”
He sighed. “I don’t really see how this will bring us to the truth, but I suppose it can’t put her in a worse position than she is in already.”
“Thank you. You won’t regret it. And your men should be standing by unobtrusively, just in case…”
“‘In case’?”
“In case the true murderer is revealed.”
We reached the gates. They were opened for us and we drove through, the tires crunching on the gravel drive.
“Could you make sure that tea is served and everyone is summoned to the lawn?” I asked him as we alighted. “And could I please go up and explain my plan to Miss Walcott?”
He looked at me and rolled his eyes. “Mrs. Sullivan, do you interfere like this in all your husband’s criminal cases?”
I smiled. “We haven’t been married long enough to tell yet. But I will say this—I have been successful before when the police have failed.”
With that I went into the house and up the long stair to Gus and Kathleen. When I entered, Kathleen was playing with the dollhouse and Gus was sitting behind her, taking notes.
“Hello, Molly,” she said, looking up as Kathleen scurried to cling to her skirts. “Any news from Sid yet?”
“She’s on her way back here, and she’s made some interesting discoveries.”
“I’ve been doing rather well myself,” she said. “I think I’ve made a good start in unlocking her language. Of course I can’t really tell. I’ve tried speaking to her in her own tongue, but she just looks confused and won’t answer.”
“Gus, I think we have one chance to help her escape this nightmare for good,” I said. “This is what I want you to do, if you’re up for it.”
I led her away from Kathleen and whispered into her ear. As I unfolded my plan, she drew away from me, looking horrified.
“Are you mad?”
Kathleen scurried under her bed at the sound of Gus’s raised voice. Gus lowered her voice and leaned closer to me, her eyes still on the cowering child. “Haven’t you thought what it might do to her? Hasn’t she suffered enough?”
I took Gus and led her into the other room. “It’s the only way,” I said. “The one chance we have. I have no other way to prove who really killed her sister. And as things stand, they’ll come and take her away however much you try to defend her, Gus. She’ll be locked up in a madhouse for life.”
“But what you’re suggesting might really drive her mad,” Gus hissed back at me.
“Isn’t it worth a risk to try and save her, even if it is going to be traumatic? And the very least we’ll get is justice for her dead sister. She’d want that, wouldn’t she?”
Gus looked at me, long and hard. “You’ve let your emotions take over before, Molly. The results haven’t always been good.”
“I know that,” I said. From the window I heard sounds on the lawn below as chairs and tables were being carried out. “But I really believe this is our one chance to reawaken her memory, if she has kept the details of that traumatic event locked away until now.”
“We’re not alienists. Either of us, Molly,” Gus said. “I like to think I know what I’m doing with the child, but I really don’t, and neither do you.”
“But since they won’t let a real alienist get involved, it’s up to us, isn’t it, and we both want what’s best for her, don’t we?”